Haye in line for Klitschko showdown

NEW WBA CHAMPION MUST FACE RUIZ FIRST

Published:

WINNING HANDS: WBA heavyweight champion David Haye shows his bruised fists to the media

DAVID Haye could be heading for a showdown fight with one of the Klitschko brothers at Wembley Stadium.

Britain’s newest heavyweight world champion was nursing a broken hand yesterday after winning the World Boxing Association title against giant Russian Nikolai Valuev in Germany on Saturday.

But Adam Booth, Haye’s trainer, revealed discussions with Wembley Stadium are already under way after his victory and the fight could take place next summer.

“Wembley have already been on to me,” said Booth. “Haye against a Klitschko, Wladimir or Vitali, would be one of the biggest fights in heavyweight history.”

The sheer scale of the gate receipts from a sellout 100,000 Wembley crowd, combined with his percentage of the pay-per-view TV subscriptions, could earn the London-born champion an estimated £20million.

Haye, 29, still celebrating his 12-round majority points success over 7ft 2in Valuev, has to defend his title with a mandatory fight against challenger John Ruiz before then.

“Ruiz is the mandatory challenger for the WBA title so if I don’t fight him they’ll take the title from me, and I don’t fancy giving it up after winning it,” said Haye. “I feel I can knock out John Ruiz.”

The fighter has already been compared to the legendary Muhammad Ali but Haye admits he is uneasy with the comparison.

“I felt a bit uncomfortable seeing that,” he said. “Ali is the greatest and I’ve had one heavyweight title win. So I’ve got a long, long way to go.

“As long as I am talked about in the same breath in 50 years maybe as a great heavyweight, then I will have done my job.”

His fight against Ruiz will almost certainly be held at the O2 Arena with victory setting up a lucrative unifying heavyweight division fight against one of the Klitschkos. Ruiz was paid to step aside and let Haye have the chance of taking the WBA’s belt from Valuev.

But the contest is unlikely to take place before next May with Haye forced to let his broken hand, sustained in the second round against Valuev, heal completely.

However, Ruiz suffered a bad cut on the way to stopping German-based Turk Adrian Serin in the seventh round of a non-title bout.

“Ruiz is a good fighter, very underrated,” said Haye. “But I will upset him pretty badly.”