Darren Till says he was two weeks into camp for Jake Paul when Cedric Doumbe was announced

Till said Paul's team approached him and that he thought a price had been agreed for Dubai on 24 December. He said he wasted about £5,000 getting his coach out for camp.

By Combat Sports UK Staff · Published Mon 2 Nov, 19:08 UK · AI-assisted reporting

Darren Till speaking on a video call on The Ariel Helwani Show — Photo: The Ariel Helwani Show

Darren Till says he had been in camp for two weeks preparing to fight Jake Paul in Dubai on 24 December when Cedric Doumbe was announced as Paul's opponent.

Till told The Ariel Helwani Show that Paul's side made the first move. "His team reached out to my team and was like, look, you know, we want to make the Till fight, you know, how do we get this done?" he said.

The former UFC title challenger said the talks were down to his manager. "I know they were back and forth, you know, negotiations over money and stuff like that. And from what I'm gathering, negotiations were going well. I think we agreed on like a price, and obviously it was going to be here in Dubai, 24th December, where I live," he said.

"They reached out to me, I didn't reach out to them. And then, yeah, for me, I thought we were all good to go. Like, I've been in camp now for the past 2 weeks with my coach. I flew him out," Till said.

He also took aim at both men. "I don't think anyone outside of his own household even knows who he is," he said of Doumbe. "Jake probably just wants to see how his jaw's holding up against someone who weighs about 150 pounds on a good day." The Dubai bout is an eight-round contest at 200lbs, and Paul's first fight since Anthony Joshua broke his jaw and knocked him out last December.

"If you want to fight me next year, fight me next year," Till said. "But yeah, so I've just wasted about £5,000 getting me coach out here for camp and stuff like that. But it doesn't matter, it's all good."

Asked when he learned he was not getting the fight, he said: "Just the same, same as everyone else." He called the way it was handled disrespectful.

"Look, Cedric's a great MMA fighter, but he can't box, can he, really?" Till said, adding that he weighs 215 pounds, "the same as Jake". Doumbe's only professional boxing bout was a four-round points win over Mohamed Fodil in 2015.

Till said a Paul fight might still be there next year, and left the door open on a return to MMA. "Everyone's always asking me, you know, come back to MMA. That could be on the cards," he said.

Nakisa Bidarian, Paul's partner at Most Valuable Promotions, has said Till was among the fighters the team had been speaking to. Till responded to the Doumbe announcement with a post on X reading "Absolutely terrified".

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Darren Till Anthony Joshua