DAVID HAYE seems angry. At a fractious press conference in Liverpool on Monday, open to the public who raucously heckled the Londoner, Haye and Tony Bellew exchanged unpleasantries ahead of their non-title fight on Saturday at the O2 in Greenwhich.
Haye did not take to the gathering of Liverpudlians infront him, rounding on the crowd to say, “Deep in all of your tiny minds you know this guy is getting drilled to the canvas pretty fast.”
Bellew eventually interrupted to bellow, “Shut the f*** up.”
And so the dialogue degenerated.
“You’re going nowhere, you’re useless.”
”You’re a broken man.”
“I’m a broken man who’s going to break your head,” Haye retorted. “I’m going to smash you’re f****** head in.”
“This right hand is going through your f****** head,” Haye added, before turning his ire on the crowd again. “All of these f****** retards know it as well.”
This was not a goodwill mission to win new fans, a fact we knew to be increasingly self-evident as Haye continued to offend and Bellew shook his head.
Whether the Liverpudlian has been angering him deliberately, whether Haye will lose his composure in the fight itself remains to be seen. But Haye remained insistent that the job would be an easy one for him. “I’ve just got to turn up and knock this dickhead out. Easy night’s work, go out there and let my hands go,” he said.
Bellew countered, “I’m not going in with this invincible, great heavyweight. I’m going in with a man who was absolutely fantastic. When David was in his prime an immense athlete, an amazing fighter and still probably as a single puncher, the most dangerous heavyweight in the world. But his gas tank is very, very low. It does not last very long… I’m expecting the very, very best of David Haye but I understand fully it’s not going to be there for very long. And when the gas tank goes out, a big fat Scouser is going to steam right through him like a steam train. I am not going to stop.”
The situation was too combustible for the boxers to stand too close together. They faced one another with large security guards stationed between until eventually, after a sustained exchange of bitter works, Haye turned away, dismissing Bellew saying, “I’m bored now.”
It seemed that Haye did unveil a flash of genuine anger, but whether that will disrupt him psychologically ahead of their fight is quite another matter. This long week though is only just beginning.
