By William Mackay: I don’t understand why Wladimir Klitschko can’t wait three short weeks for David Haye’s back injury to heal so that they can fight on July 11th. This is only the biggest heavyweight match that has come about in the last few years and yet Wladimir is willing to turn his back on it and fight a replacement opponent Ruslan Chagaev (25-0, 17 KOs) instead on the 20th of June.

That seems highly unfair to Haye, who busted his backside going out and selling the fight with his promotional genius, and bad for the fans that’ve purchased tickets to see Wladimir fight Haye and not another heavyweight like Chagaev. I can’t think of one person thus far that want to see Wladimir fight Chagaev.

The fight has knockout written all over it with Chagaev fighting only twice in the past two years since beating Nikolay Valuev to win the World Boxing Association heavyweight title. Chagaev has been forced to deal with a lingering illness and a ruptured Achilles tendon injury in the past year and Wladimir is getting him at the right time for what looks to be a bad mismatch.

There’s no suspense in a Chagaev-Wladimir fight compared to a fight between Haye and Wladimir. With a fight against Haye, you have no idea who’s going to win because of the huge power that Haye possesses in each hand. To be sure, Haye is equally vulnerable to getting knocked out if Wladimir comes out firing away with his power shots.

That’s what makes this fight so appealing for the typical boxing fan. You won’t get that with Wladimir fighting the short, slow 6’1″ Chagaev, who will be trying his best to shake of two years of rust against a heavyweight that is six inches taller, and much quicker in Wladimir.

I don’t see how Wladimir can’t fight Haye, because if he doesn’t wait the three weeks for Haye’s back injury to heal, people are going to think he’s scared of Haye and took advantage of David’s injury to get of having to fight him. It isn’t as if Haye is asking Wladimir to wait a month or two for the injury to heal.

All we’re talking about is three short weeks before Haye will be in tip top shape and ready to fight Wladimir. How can that be such a big deal for Wladimir not to wait the three weeks? Look at it this way, if Wladimir can’t do it for Haye’s sake then he need to think about the thousands of boxing fans that paid money for him to fight Haye.

I’m willing to bet that many of these people wouldn’t have bothered buying tickets if they knew that Wladimir was going to turn around and fight someone else other than Haye.

If Wladimir is upset with the way that Haye humiliated him in their press conferences with his trash talking and t-shirt, then the best way for Wladimir to get back at Haye is for him to wait the three weeks and try to beat him in the ring on July 11th.