David Haye versus Goliath

The landscape of international boxing has altered significantly over the past few years and non more so than the heavyweight division. Once the outright domain of top American fighters, we now have new kids on the block from eastern Europe. The great American heavyweights just rolled off the production line with monotonous regularity but all that seems to have temporary dried up as we speak.

Russian and Ukranian fighters now hold all the current World Championship belts and this Saturday, David Haye of the UK will take on the man mountain Nikolai Valuev in what will prove to be one of the most eagerly awaited fights in recent months. There are many experts who don’t give Haye much of a chance and that may surprise a few people who then may be interested in the latest online sports betting odds on bwin.com where Haye is currently priced at 1.68 with Valuev at 2.15.

In a sport where draws are almost unheard of then anything better than even money has to be a great bet on Valuev. The best chance that Haye has is to try to outbox Valuev and win on points. Seeing as Haye will become the first ever fighter to knock out Valuev then you can see the enormity of the task! With the Russian at a staggering 7ft 2in then Haye will seriously have his work cut-out but that hasn’t prevented him from mouthing a string of obscenities this week at his opponent and his camp.

Haye reckons that he will “embarrass” Valuev come Saturday night but talk is cheap and it is common for fighters at all weights to be extremely bullish about their chances before a fight. They know that a great percentage of fighting is in the mental preparation and psychological equilibrium that must exist to optimise true performance.

Boxing when all said and done is an individual sport, they may have trainers and all other types of back up but when that bell goes and they step out into that ring then they are very much on their own. All of the hype and the mental preparation in the world can go out of the window in the minutes leading up to a fight. I have seen fighters mentally crumble on the walk up to the ring itself and you just knew by looking into their eyes that they knew that they couldn’t win.

It will be very interesting to see the opening scenes of this fight before the first round because I for one am not totally convinced that Valuev should be the outsider in this fight. When a fighter basically only has one way to win a fight then that has to be a handicap in my opinion. The betting odds on a round per round basis show that if the fight doesn’t go the distance then it will be Valuev that will triumph.

But the really interesting thing about this fight from a betting point of view is in how Valuev’s past opponents compare to facing an accomplished boxer like Haye. Many experts believe that Valuev may struggle to cope against Haye’s speed and that Valuev himself only has one chance to beat Haye and that is by finding a big punch from somewhere. We will have to wait until Saturday night to find that out.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson