David Haye has shone and shocked in equal measure... but it is good to have him back - Steve Bunce

Steve Bunce on Boxing

Steve Bunce
Tuesday 12 January 2016 18:27 GMT
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In 2002 David Haye made his professional debut behind closed doors and won in two rounds. Three hours later he had slipped into a white suit and was sitting next to David Beckham at the BBC’s Sports Personality of the Year.

His career has been like that ever since, with some dizzy highs on unforgettable nights and lows that were both shocking and comic. This Saturday at the O2 Arena in London Haye is back after three and half years on the celebrity circuit to fight a man called Mark de Mori, who looks and fights like somebody that Rocky beat in film three or four of the glorious franchise – he is too brave for his own limitations.

Haye won and lost the world heavyweight title in just over two years of hype, fun and big paydays. His reign as champion started and ended in Germany in fights of such bewildering contrasts that it is hard to reconcile the victory of one with the dismal failure of the other.

In 2009 Haye conceded 99 pounds in weight, 11 inches in height and picked the pocket of the man dubbed the “Beast from the East” in one of the finest tactical displays by a British boxer. Nikolai Valuev, a man-mountain who married a ballerina and wanted to be a poet, lost his WBA title that night and walked off into the dark forests to hunt bears, leaving behind a profound sadness in his wake.

Haye dumbfounded his critics and made a fortune because his broadcaster – Sky at the time – miscalculated the attraction of the boxer with the model looks fighting a man who was packaged as a living monster. “He stinks like some type of wild animal, he’s covered in thick hair and he’s not like a man,” said Haye and then pocketed a large seven-figure purse from his end of the pay-per-view revenue.

At the time Joe Calzaghe and Ricky Hatton were retired or out of action after fabulous careers and Carl Froch was at the start of a career-long fight for recognition; Haye was the boxing star of British sport. A fight against former champion John Ruiz made him another couple of million and the three-round scuffle with Audley Harrison in 2010 gripped a nation, and was possibly one of the worst heavyweight title fights in history. Haye was big business and a fight loomed with Wladimir Klitschko, the custodian of the other world belts.

“I have the perfect game-plan to beat this big robot,” said Haye in 2011 when the fight was signed and sealed for July in Hamburg. “What do you think I have been doing for the last three years? This is what I have been preparing for.” Sadly, a weight fell on his toe three weeks before the fight, broke a bone and rendered his powers mute. I know, it sounds a bit crazy, but it is true. And it did ruin his ability to fight. However, it should never have been mentioned and under no circumstance should he have attended the post-fight press conference wearing flip-flops with the toe swollen, red and ridiculously out of place.

“A fighter should never say that he has a broken toe after a defeat,” said Klitschko. “And you want a rematch... [laughs]. I never thought I would hear those words from you.” Haye, never a big heavyweight, was shrinking by the second and limped dramatically away from the podium that night looking like a tiny, confused boy.

There are some who suggested Haye lost his guts in that fight, was caught and hurt and then retreated behind a regrettable, survivable plan. He was hurt, he was caught but there is nothing wrong with his guts. He lost because big Wlad was too good, never took a single risk and could bully yet another smaller heavyweight around the ring. Take the bloody toe out of the midnight debacle and it was just a loss.

A few months later Haye retired but in February the following year, in Munich, he was swinging elbows, punches and camera tri-pods at Dereck Chisora at a post-fight press conference.

Earlier on that chaotic night, Chisora had pushed Wladimir’s big brother Vitali the full 12 rounds for the world title. In the fall-out from the after-fight violence, a match was made between Chisora and Haye, who seemed delighted to ditch his retirement.

They fought five savage rounds at Upton Park in a downpour in the summer of that year. Haye won and vanished. A few months ago he walked into Shane McGuigan’s gym in Battersea with a serious look on his old face to end the exile. It’s a delight to have him back.s

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