Haye Takes WBA Heavy Title!
David Haye defeated giant Nikolay Valuev via a majority decision to make history and win the WBA version of the world heavyweight crown.
It went to the judges scorecards whose verdict was 114-114 and 116-112, 116-112 to Haye. It was a close and largely uneventful fight and it was not clear which way the verdict was going to go before the judges tallies were announced. However, Haye had managed to overcome the 7 stone weight disparity and 11 inch height difference.
Some observers had Valuev winning but the majority felt Haye had nicked it. Some of the rounds were extremely difficult to score with Valuev constantly plodding forwards and missing with single jabs while Haye backed off, moved around and threw very few of his own punches.
The first round was very quiet with little landing and the second also saw Valuev struggling to land while Haye landed the odd single blow while retreating. It was evident that Haye was looking to use his vastly superior speed and skills to land some scoring blows and then get away quickly to avoid being countered.
It seemed Haye edged a couple of rounds but then Valuev perhaps edged some of the middle rounds as his constant forward motion saw him land the odd glancing shot here and there. I then gave Haye the eigth and ninth but only marginally.
As we approached the last three rounds it was difficult to tell who the judges would have ahead. My feeling was that with the fight being in Germany they would probably have Valuev ahead, even though he was very ineffective and looked incapable of landing any clean blows on Haye.
Haye still didn't seem to step on the gas and I felt he should be letting more punches go by the tenth. Valuev pressed forward and perhaps took the eleventh. Then came the last round with Valuev continuing to press Haye but with more urgency. Haye then caught Valuev with a good combination and a left staggered him. For a moment you felt he may even go down as Haye briefly tried to follow up, but then the giant gathered himself, continued to plod forward and Haye opted not to try and capitalise further on his success. The round wound down and the bell rang. I had Haye just one point up.
Haye felt he had done enough and so did his fans in the crowd but awaiting the verdict you sensed it could have gone either way.
I think that a Haye win is a good result for boxing and he can progress from this performance and look more impressive in the future. What would have happened if he had thrown more punches and gone for the KO earlier? He did hurt Valuev in the last round.
He has to defend against perennial challenger John Ruiz next and Haye would be a strong favourite for that one.
However, the Klitschko's are the real world heavyweight champions and David must fight either Vitali or Vladimir or both before he can claim to be the best heavyweight in the world. The Klitschko's are an entirely different proposition and fights in which I would expect Haye to be a big underdog still.
We can now look forward to those fights, the Klitschko's will happily fight Haye and Haye will also relish this greater challenge.
In the meantime David can relax for a while and enjoy all the accolades of being the new WBA heavyweight champion of the world!