David Adeleye insists there was no soul searching required in the wake of his lopsided points loss to Filip Hrgovic which left him on a run of two defeats in his last four.

The Londoner opted to vacate his British heavyweight title in order to face Hrgovic at Manchester’s Co-op Live Arena on August 16, but things did not go to plan against the Croatian contender in their 10-rounder.

Two of the judges scored Hrgovic, who dropped Adeleye heavily in the eighth, a 99-90 winner, while the other had it one round closer at 98-91. Aside from a crazy fight-back in the eighth, Adeleye had broadly struggled to impose himself on Hrgovic, who suffered a nasty cut in the second.

Following his seventh-round stoppage loss to Fabio Wardley in October 2023, losing to Hrgovic was a major body blow to his world title ambitions, but the 29-year-old "Big D" was philosophical in his assessment.

He said: “I don’t need to soul search because I know who I am. It didn’t go my way, and I was extremely frustrated, but there are certain ways you’ve got to look at it. I’ve got to get back on that horse and carry on riding.

“There are worse things going on in the world, people are waking up losing loved ones, some people have got incurable diseases, some don’t know when their next meal is coming.

“I know the man I am, and I know what I can and can’t do in the ring. These are opponents I should be beating, and moving forward in the future it helps me to have that little frustrating time.

“Losing wasn’t the end of the world. Now it’s just about how I move forward.”

That next move comes on December 19, when Adeleye (14-2, 13 KOs) will feature on a card in Nigeria, the country of his parents’ birth, as part of Queensberry’s first promotion in west Africa.

Adeleye and his Queensberry stablemate Lawrence Okolie will both be in action on the night, although not against each other, and they have been training together in Dubai in preparation.

“I split my camp,” Adeleye said from his Dubai training base. “I’ve done some of it in the UK and then now I’ve done it in Dubai. My coach Adam [Booth] will be flying out to join me for the last few weeks.”

Footage of Adeleye and Okolie, the former cruiserweight world champion-turned-heavyweight contender, has been uploaded to social media. Now, given they both have designs on climbing towards a crack at the world heavyweight title, does Adeleye see them ever fighting?

“I’ve got someone I’ve got to focus on for December 19,” he replied. “So I focus on them more right now. Lawrence is not going to be my opponent anytime soon, so it doesn’t really matter. I’m on a trajectory and he’s on his trajectory.

“I’ve known Lawrence for years, we sparred years ago. We were both doing our thing in different divisions when he was a cruiserweight. He’s a good fighter.”