“She hasn’t done anything.”
Caroline Dubois left Terri Harper lost for words as the rivals filmed the latest episode of The Gloves Are Off.
Harper, the reigning WBO lightweight world champion who previously held major titles at super-featherweight and super-welterweight, watched as the Londoner launched a cold salvo of trash-talking. Stung, Harper shot back: “Tell me what you’ve done. Another stupid comment.”
Angry at being written off, Harper warned Dubois not to underestimate her. “To be overlooking me and just thinking I’m going to be laid down and let her take the belt,” she said, adding: “I’m here to make you taste your first defeat and rebuild and see how it feels. She’s got a lot of maturing to do.”
Dubois, the unbeaten WBC champion, maintained an icy ferocity. “I don’t rate you. I don’t rate what you’ve done, I don’t rate who you are as an athlete, as a fighter, as a person, I don’t rate it,” she told Harper. “I believe respect is earned, never given. I don’t think she’s earned my respect. She wants me to come and be nice. And I’m not going to do that.”
Their unification clash for the WBC and WBO titles on Sunday April 5, live on Sky Sports, has become increasingly personal. Their head-to-head on The Gloves Are Off — and a lingering confrontation afterwards — underscored the intensity.
“This fight for me is not about the belts. It’s nice to win the belts. But it’s even nicer to beat Dubois,” Harper declared. Dubois, who warned that the challenger is “coming to take my belt, coming to take everything I’ve been fighting for since I was nine years old, coming to take my legacy,” added: “If she wins, she’s taken all of that.”