Haye has 1 month left before he faces Klitschko and his moment of truth

By Boxing News - 06/02/2011 - Comments

Image: Haye has 1 month left before he faces Klitschko and his moment of truthBy William Mackay: WBA heavyweight champion David Haye (25-1, 23 KO’s) has had an easy ride through the heavyweight ranks to pick up what many boxing fans see as a paper title in beating the weakest of the heavyweight champions in the slow-moving, slow punching Nikolay Valuev in 2009. Haye barely won that fight. And now Haye is finally facing a quality heavyweight at three years in his unification bout against IBF/WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko (55-3, 49 KO’s) one month from now on July 2nd at the Imtech Arena in Hamburg, Germany.

Haye says that Wladimir has never faced fresh young heavyweight like him, even though Haye isn’t young at soon to be 31 and he plans on retiring at the end of this year. What can you say about Haye’s chances in this fight? Some of the top British writers see Haye as a good small heavyweight facing a good big heavyweight in Wladimir. That alone suggests that Haye simply won’t have the size to compete. Picture a short guy having to jump up to try and land a big shot against a towering giant that that’s what we have here.

To be sure, the 6’2″ Haye has the height and reach to land a shot if he could get close enough. The real problem is that Wladimir won’t let him and won’t want to make any suicidal mad dashes forward to try and land something. He won’t because he’ll be too afraid and will play it safe just as he was when he fought Audley Harrison last November. Haye didn’t take any chances in that fight until he was absolutely certain that the coast was clear and that Harrison wasn’t going to throw any punches of his own.

As soon as it dawned on Haye that Harrison was too scared to throw anything back, Haye finally got his confidence and started to throw some punches in the 3rd round. Wladimir will easily be able to avoid Haye’s attacks because he’ll back away and make Haye miss with his wild shots. Haye will then be reduced to swinging at air and moving around the ring in useless circles without aim. All that will do is waste energy for Haye and prolong the inevitable.



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