Fabio Wardley reveals the fight he would never agree to and claims he would even ‘take a knee in the first round'

Scottish Sun

9 hours ago

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FABIO WARDLEY has floored the baffling suggestion that he could fight his mentor and pal Dillian Whyte.
After following all of Wardley's career, we were stunned to hear the idea even mooted from some clumsy pundits.
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Fabio Wardley has ruled out fighting his manager and mentor Dillian Whyte
Credit: @fabiowardley
But Wardley told SunSport with a laugh: 'From the second it would be announced, everybody who knows the sport and who knows us, would know it would be fake and not something I would ever do, because of the amount of love, respect and admiration I have for Dills.
'People go on about my story, white-collar, coming from nowhere, sparring Usyk.
"But none of that is possible without Dillian at the beginning, giving me all of these opportunities.
'So I would never spit in his face and fight him.
'Even if all the sanctioning bodies called for the fight and somebody was silly enough to put all the money up, I would take a knee in the first round and give him the win.'
Ipswich's 30-year-old former recruitment worker and white-collar boxer headlines Portman Road on Saturday night against tough Australian Justis Huni.
Whyte was due to feature on the Ipswich undercard but pulled out to secure a summer showdown with Lawrence Okolie.
He has not boxed in England since November 2022 and was supposed to have a rematch with Anthony Joshua in August 2023.
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But that O2 sell-out was scrapped when Whyte failed a doping test.
Whyte has boxed in Gibraltar and Ireland since that big-money clash was binned, landing underwhelming wins.
Fabio Wardley prepares for dream Portman Road homecoming fight
For Wardley, on June 16 his partner is scheduled to give birth to his first child, a bouncing baby girl.
For anyone else, the nail-biting fortnight would be a crippling rollercoaster of emotions impossible to combine.
But the Suffolk Puncher - who went on an Oleksandr Usyk sparring trip to Ukraine in 2018 when he barely knew how to throw a jab - is loving the chaos.
The class act told SunSport: 'June 2025 is going to be a wild month I talk a lot about, for the rest of my life.
'I will be an old man in a rocking chair, telling people about it and wondering how we pulled it off.
'Everything has come together at the same time, it might seem a bit hectic but I wouldn't have it any other way. I thrive on it, I love the chaos.'
Nine months ago, the 18-0-1 ace got the wonderful news he would be a dad for the first time.
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And a few weeks later he got the offer of a lifetime, to headline at his boyhood football club, a chance that some Olympic and world champions never get.
It seems like a psychological and logistical nightmare that would be destined for the divorce courts but Team Wardley is way too tight.
'If my little girl is anything like me, then she'll be chilled out and late, which will give me a little bit more time to decompress from the fight,' he grinned.
'The flight date has been moved around a few times but my missus has been unbelievable.
'I have just promised to her that, as soon as Saturday night is over, I am all theirs.
'This week, though, is just my week. I need to be totally focused on me and then it's all on them.'
Wardley - who cracked 2020 Olympic bronze winner Frazer Clarke's skull in their one-round rematch in October - somehow combines being a brutal boxer with being a lovely bloke and he insists that won't change with another win or a baby.
'I don't know how parenthood will affect me,' he said. 'I do plan to be the fun-dad though.
'I want mum to do the telling off. I think I will always be driven to push myself in everything, though.
'That's something just innate in me. And I am sure I will need to feed and stoke that fire regularly.'
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Wardley and his girlfriend are expecting their first child together
Credit: Instagram @fabiowardley