Dillian Whyte's former foe "heard through the grapevine" Whyte was hurt before Moses Itauma bout

Dillian Whyte recently had a rough setback against Moses Itauma, and a former opponent of Whyte has weighed in on that contest. Lucas Browne is the fighter in question, and this Whyte-Itauma fight was one of several subjects he covered in an interview with Bare Knuckle Bowker after Browne's successful debut win in gloveless combat at BKB 45.

"I don't know about great heavyweight, but definitely he is on fire and yeah, well done to the kid. He's only young, so that's great. I've heard through the grapevine; there's absolutely no, I can't guarantee any of this information, but Dillian Whyte like hurt and or broke his ankle like prior. But he still was going for a payday no matter what. So he did look like absolute s**t, I won't lie. And against me, he was literally on fire. He was top three in the world and was on fire."

Dillian Whyte "was nowhere near that person" who fought Lucas Browne when he fought Moses Itauma, per Browne

As he kept expounding upon his thoughts on Dillian Whyte's disparately different showings against Itauma as well as against himself, Browne continued [via Bare Knuckle Bowker],

"Usually when people fight me, they are the best you [have] ever seen because it's me. No matter what, I could be losing 11 rounds and I'll still knock you out in the 12th because I got the power to do so. So yeah, people are generally the best they've ever been, and he was. I wasn't mentally sort of there, and physically I wasn't as good as I should have been, and he was on fire. So I think he; when he's turned up for his last spot, he was nowhere near that person and you could tell from the start."