The pair is set to fight for real in Manchester on Saturday night on DAZN, but there were no broadcast cameras present nearly nine years ago when they first sparred at east London’s old Peacock Gym.

They had made their professional debuts on the same night, April 8, 2017, but Dubois was the far more experienced boxer given his amateur pedigree. Wardley, with only four white-collar bouts to his name before turning professional, was very green by comparison.

But he was doing his learning on the job and had no trouble travelling to London from his home in Ipswich in search of elite sparring partners. Dubois, who has since gone on to win the world heavyweight title, fitted into that bracket.

“I am not here to lie,” Wardley begins, when asked to reflect on those spars with Dubois, three years his junior.

“I have got no qualms in saying he punched me up, but I would beg him not to take anything from that spar and carry that through to now because that was a guy had barely boxed against someone who had an amateur career, junior champion, GB champion, this and all the others.

“Whereas I put on the gloves a few weeks ago and thought, 'Yeah let’s have a move around with Daniel Dubois.’

“I wasn’t nervous. I knew it would be a tough spar but I always kind of relished it and enjoyed the challenge it because it was about getting a bit better by a minor increment.

“I would come out of sparing and think, 'I only got punched up 15 times but that was two less than last week,’ and that was fine. I didn’t care and wasn’t like scorekeeping and thinking I had to win.

“I went into it knowing that currently he is better than me and I’ve got no problem with that. I’m trying to get better and the only way to do that is to compete with people better than me.

“There is no point me staying in my little old white collar gym and smashing up Steve who comes in every other week and thinking I am the man. For me, at that stage of my career, my mentality was to get around, spar everyone as much as possible and gain as much experience as you can.”

For Dubois, who challenges Wardley for his WBO heavyweight title, he also felt well in control against the relative novice from Suffolk.

At the time, Dubois was spending a lot of time sparring all comers in the Peacock as he attempted to make the transition from a highly touted amateur with only a handful of senior bouts to a professional capable of mixing it with men.

During a media roundtable, Dubois said: “It was years back. I dominated him in the spars back then. I was dominating him, but I understand things change. He’s come on since then obviously. I'm looking for the best version of him and I'll be the best version for sure.

“Credit to him, he’s beating all the guys that he’s faced. You’ve got to take your hat off to that. He’s wanted the biggest challenges and he’s taken them on and I respect him for that.

“When we sparred we were in some good old tear-ups, but I was the one in charge and I'm going to be doing it again. It will be the same story and I'll be a two-time champion of the world.”

The bookmakers can barely split the two, who meet at the top of the Queensberry event "Don’t Blink" due to the explosive nature of the main event.

They share a KO ratio of 95 percent, and the last time either of them won a fight on points was in 2018.

So was Dubois the biggest puncher that Wardley has sparred? 

“He was definitely up there as one of the big punchers I was in with, but there were a lot I was sharing the ring with at that time,” he said.

“There was Derek Chisora, there was Dillian Whyte, there was him, there was Filip Hrgovic. It wasn’t like Daniel was a standout. It was just known that he was pretty solid and could whack a bit.

“There were even cruiserweights. I remember sparring Richard Riakporhe. He could whack and I remember him cracking me as well and I was thinking, ‘Jesus, some of these boys can proper hit,’ but again, that was seven or eight years ago.

“It was probably some of it was due to how green I was, me taking shots and not even moving, taking it straight to the dome and that would rack my brain a bit.”