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By James Slater – It’s still too early to celebrate, but those fans hoping to see rival heavyweight champions Wladimir Klitschko and David Haye fight may finally get what they want this coming summer. Various news sources are reporting that negotiations for the unification clash are going as well as could be hoped for, and fight news.com and The LA Times are even suggesting the month fight may take place on.
Late spring or early summer look likely, The LA Times says, and they have quoted Golden Boys’ Richard Schaefer – “David wants the fight. We are working now on the date and the venue.”
Schaefer said the likelihood is the fight will go ahead in one of Germany’s huge soccer stadiums, in either Dusseldorf or Frankfurt. While Klitschko advisor Tom Loeffler is as optimistic as he’s been in a long while, telling the LA Times that “We’ve seen a lot more willingness from Haye than in the past in these talks. It seems he’s finally willing to take the challenge..”
Haye, of course, has always maintained he wants the fight. Kitschko (actually both Klitschkos) have also wanted the fight for the longest time, and now – at last – the silly games appear to have been played and the serious talk is being done.
According to Schaefer and Loeffler, again as reported by The LA Times, the only sticking point that now remains is finding a date that will not conflict with Europe’s busy soccer schedule, and also of finding a date that will be agreeable to both RTL television in Germany and Sky Sports in the UK. Encouragingly, Schaefer added that a late spring, early summer date is “realistic” at present.
The heavyweight division needs this fight. As popular as they are in Germany and the rest of Europe, U.S fans have long since tired of watching the “safety-first” Klitschko brothers take their time in bashing up over-matched challenger and over-matched challenger. Of course, it’s not the fault of either Wladimir or Vitali that they are simply too good for the rest of the heavyweight division, but many fans wants too see exciting heavyweight battles. This is where Haye comes in.
Despite his faults, Haye is almost always fun to watch, and against the biggest and the best he will either rise to the challenge or at the very least go down fighting. For what seems like the longest time now, we have wondered which of these two scenarios we will see when Haye fights a Klitschko. Now it seems we are as close as ever to seeing the fight play out in living colour.
Is Germany the best place to host the fight? There will be no bringing the heavyweight “glamour” back to Las Vegas, as was assumed would be the case at one point in negotiations, but with the German stadiums having a 50,000 capacity or greater, the fight being held at such a location will guarantee huge money for all concerned.
At one time, it looked like the two sides would never be able to agree due to the staggering amounts of cash that were at stake. Now, the two teams have realised that this fight is too much of a money spinner not to happen.