Floyd Schofield was tested, at his own request, by the Voluntary Anti-Doping Association (VADA) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Wednesday.

The 22-year-old was due to challenge WBC lightweight champion Shakur Stevenson on Saturday’s ‘Last Crescendo’ event only to start to feel unwell on Tuesday, hours before he was due to appear at the grand arrivals.

Doctors from the British Boxing Board of Control (BBBoC), the commissioners of the card, observed Schofield at 6.30pm local time. A source close to the situation told BoxingScene that Schofield’s symptoms were “non-specific” but concerning enough for him to immediately be transferred to hospital and declared unfit to fight.

Schofield and his team remain convinced that he was poisoned. His father, Floyd Schofield Snr, posted a video of the boxer in hospital, even alleging that someone had “tried to kill” his son. 

By Wednesday evening, Schofield’s condition had returned to normal. Suggestions of being spiked seem extreme but, according to a source in Saudi Arabia, that remains a possible explanation considering the symptoms that were observed. The BBBoC will complete their own investigations once test results have been analysed.

Stevenson will now fight substitute Josh Padley who arrived in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday and is ranked 12th at lightweight by the WBC after defeating Marc Chamberlain in September.

At Wednesday’s open workouts, Stevenson said of Schofield’s withdrawal: “I was kind of expecting it. I knew the kid was scared from the start, I knew he was scared from the jump. When I seen him, he was definitely scared.”