Lani (The Smiling Assassin) Daniels has returned to farm life in New Zealand after she shocked the world with her TKO win against US boxer Shadasia Green, becoming the newly crowned IBF/WBO/Ring super middleweight world champion.
Daniels won the title on the weekend after she stopped the fight early on the ninth round due to a technical knockout, leaving opponent Shadasia Green unable to continue.
“I was just so happy, it was like a brief second of like, did I just did I do it?” she says.
Green was carried away on a stretcher after suffering a brain bleed.
“The stoppage caught me off Guard. I was like ‘what the hecka, that just really happened’” says Daniels.
“I just felt like an egg. Like, Lani, calm your farm, my thoughts just went straight to her and her whānau”.
Many have discussed the bout as a ‘major upset’ due to thoughts that the win was with Green’s reputation in mind. Daniels says her team didn’t share the same mindset.
“This is how choice my team is, they don’t see it as an upset... they had so much belief in me that we were going there to do what we had prepared to do.”
“I suppose coming off my last two fights, coming off to losses didn’t help the case. I think it made for a ,better story. But yes, it was big in the boxing scene”.
Daniels is now back in New Zealand and says life has returned to normal.
“Back to reality - milk the cows, feeding the pigs, back to the usual, back home here in Pipiwai”.
“We were talking and having laughs over there the whole time about lapping it up because we know as soon as we come home our party will be popped,” she says.
For now, Daniels will be out in the community coaching basketball for a school and be immersed in home life while she waits to retrieve her belts, leaving a message for other fighters.
“Just a massive mihi to anybody out there that’s going through something that they’re struggling with. Whatever their fight is that they’re fighting, just keep on punching, and things do get better”.a
