By John F. McKenna (McJack): WBA Heavyweight Champion David Haye (25-1, 23 KO’s) unveiled the latest stage of his strategic plan to undermine IBF, IBO, WBO and Ring Magazine belt holder Vitali Klitschko (55-3, 49 KO’S) at their joint press conference ahead of their Saturday night showdown. Haye and Klitschko will square off in Hamburg, Germany at the Imtech Arena for their Heavyweight Title unification fight on July 2.

Months ago Haye trainer and manager Adam Booth identified what he and Haye believe is a chink in the mental armor that surrounds Wladimir Klitschko. Booth is not only Haye’s manager, but also his confidant and strategist. It is thought by some that Adam Booth is the one who concocted all the verbal insults and antics that are designed to get inside the head of Wladimir. The hope is to break Vladimir down mentally by ruthlessly attacking him again and again at every opportunity.

The Haye camp strategy is two fold. The first part of the strategy is to drive up interest in the fight in which Haye is the clear underdog. The second part of the plan is to take Vladimir out of his normal game plan by getting inside his head.

The first part of that strategy is clearly working. Early reports are that the pre sales on Sky Box Office for the Super Fight could overhaul the 1.2 million buys for the Ricky Hatton – Floyd Mayweather title fight in December 2008.

At the press conference Haye succeeded in getting under the skin of Wladimir, his brother Vitali and veteran trainer Emanuel Steward. Haye and his group deliberately showed up thirty minutes late for the event. Over two hours the Haye camp pulled out all the stops in their game of psychological warfare. Stweard was left speechless when Haye’s punching coach Paddy Fitzpatrick alleged that he had seen Emanuel apply illegal hand wraps in the past. At that point Steward offered to fight Fitzpatrick.

Later on Steward acknowledged that Vladimir was more emotional in the build up for this fight than any other fight that he had worked with him on.

Haye in his continuing effort to mentally destabilize Klitschko referred to him as a “robot” and that he will cause the “robot” to “malfunction.”

Haye stated at the press conference that he is glad that his fight with Klitschko did not happen a couple of years ago, because he is much better prepared now and that he has “the perfect game plan” to defeat Klitschko.

Love him or hate him, it cannot be denied that David Haye has injected a huge amount of interest in a heavyweight fight for the first time in years. The only thing that remains to be seen is whether or not he can back up his big words.