David Haye v Tomasz Bonin DRBR 10pm UK time Friday

[superheavyrhun]

OK, so I figured as this one is the biggest fight I'll have done an RBR for this year, that I'll put it up a few days early and maybe y'all can put some picks up yadda yadda yadda. Like Wacko does in the real DRBR's....

The main fight from Wembley Arena is David Haye's first fight in with the big boys, and he is fighting Tomasz Bonin over 10 rounds, whose only defeat came in a premature stoppage against Audley Harrison. Bonin is rated in the top 20 by some organisations, and although he lost to Audley, will be a decent benchmark for Haye's first fight at this weight. Here's my take on proceedings:

David Haye: (18-1, 17KOs) Haye's move to heavyweight has been a time in the pipeline, and although he has said he will have one more fight at Cruiserweight, it will only be to fill the mandatory slot against Jean Mark Mormeck for his WBC and WBA cruiserweight belts. Even if he wins, he's promised to return to heavyweight. The move up in weight is a case of HAye increasingly having to sweat down to get his 6'3" frame to the weight, and the breakdown in talks for a British super-fight between him and Enzo Maccarinelli. Haye's power at cruiserweight is undoubted, with his only 12 rounder coming against Ismail Abdoul, where Haye was looking to test his stamina more than anything. Whether he'll have the power is another question entirely. Technically Haye often carries a low guard, but as he knows the force at cruiserweight is less than at heavyweight, and he might well look to be more defensive among the power fighters. Last time out a ninth-round finish of Giancobbe Fragomeni in the last defence of his European Cruiserweight belt tested Haye's chin well, and he showed that he is not scared of fighting with blood in his eyes, overcoming a nasty cut to force the Italian's corner to throw in the towel. Haye should do well on Friday night, and I expect him not to have to go a full 10 rounds.

Tomasz Bonin: (37-1, 20 KOs) Bonin's decent numbers in the record are certainly the result of a protective manager, and his top 20 ranking by some governing bodies is extremely overhyped, with his last fight a second-round knockout of a fighter in his pro debut. Since his 2004 defeat to Audley for the minority WBF world title, in a ninth-round stoppage, Bonin has rarely been in with quality, only being scheduled for 12 rounds twice in nine fights, both for the IBC title, which is a bauble compared to the WBF title he fought for. Bonin has also rarely battled outside of Poland, with two fights in Germany, two fights in Illinois, and the defeat against Audley at Wembley. Bonin is little but a fall guy for Haye's heavyweight debut, and as the 5-10 record of his 37th opponent Alexander Subin testifies, he is rarely put in with decent fighters, despite his 33 years, and is likely to make Haye look good.

All in all, I think Bonin is an ideal introduction for David Haye in the heavyweights, and at 26 years old, Haye will have bigger, tougher, and more hard-hitting opponents than this chap to come if he is to fulfill his ambition of fighting for world honours. Haye is two inches taller than Bonin, so I can't see beyond a mid to late Haye stoppage, and going to points might be considered a minor setback for the Hayemaker's dreams.



Also on the bill is the British title fight at Light Heavyweight between Peter Oboh (14-5, 12KOs) and Tony Oakey (23-2, 5KOs), this one scheduled for the championship 12 rounds. This is Oboh's return to the ring after almost three years out, and the BBBofC had not stripped him of his title, so it will be interesting to see the level of ring-rust on him. At 38, the Nigerian born Oboh is no spring chicken, but some of his losses are to creditable opponents such as Johnny Nelson and Gary Delaney at Cruiserweight. Oboh's hard-punching style has seen him avoided time and again, and in the period without a fight Oboh has been stripped of his Commonwealth crown and WBA Inter-continental belt which he held back in 2004 after his 10 round KO victory over Andrew Lowe.

Oakey, 23-2, is on the comeback trail after dual setbacks of a drugs ban and contraversial defeat against Peter Haymer for the English title. His 2003 split decision loss to Matthew Barney was compounded after cocaine was found in his system, and he was slapped with a 12-month ban. Four months after returning he lost 95-96 against Haymer for the English belt, and since then has four points wins, including last time out in March over jounreyman Josip Jalusic.

Should be good to see Oboh back in the ring, and I'd tip him to hang on to his British belt despite Oakey's more recent activity and awkward style.


It all starts at 10pm UK time, 5pm EST and the rest of y'all will just have to figure it out for yourselves, but should be another good night's boxing.

[Sovereign]

good work mate, cc, if I can't get home to watch it on sky I'll be right here on friday night being a boring twat instead of living it up in manchester with all my student buddies.

[CutMeMick]

1st things 1st CC#422 on me on a job well done

Guess where I'll be Sat. during the fight?


You gotdamn! right I'm gonna be here for the rd. by rd.

By the way I voted Haye TKO.

[CutMeMick]

BY THE WAY I'M MAKING THIS A STICKY ICKY!!!

[BoxingGorilla]

HAYE KO

Thanks for the UK RBR's Cool Click today... and one on Friday

[superheavyrhun]

Guess where I'll be Sat. during the fight?

Would it be overly frivoulous of me to say you'll be sat at ringside in the david haye corner....giving him choice words of advice?

[Memphis]

Nice one mate, have a CC.

Haye by violent KO in the first. I was right about Barrios

[smashup]

2nd or 3rd round KO.
But it WILL end in a KO
Haye sparks him.

[superheavyrhun]

2nd or 3rd round KO.
But it WILL end in a KO
Haye sparks him.

Well, the good news from all of these early KO predictions is that it will give Sky plenty of air to fill, and that they will hopefully broadcast the whole of the Oboh/Oakey fight....either that or more yakking from Johnny Nelson and Nicky Piper. I like them well enough, but I still wouldn't cut out rounds to hear them talking....

[ICB]

Haye by mid round ko or tko.

[Sovereign]

yeah, Haye KO in under 4 rounds. Bonin's a credible test but Haye's got too much for him.

[CutMeMick]

Guess where I'll be Sat. during the fight?

Would it be overly frivoulous of me to say you'll be sat at ringside in the david haye corner....giving him choice words of advice?

Nah! Smashups allover this one.

[smashup]

hahahaha "Frivolous" ;

GOOD HAYE ARTICLE wil bale www.britishboxing.net

David Haye came face-to-face with his first heavyweight opponent Pole Tomasz Bonin today ahead of their clash at Wembley on Friday (27th April). Instead of biding his time and waiting for his WBC cruiserweight title shot to filter through boxing's many layers of poli-tricks, the Bermondsey banger his opted to face the powerful and bullish Bonin in a risky and dangerous assignment.

The reward? A top-15 ranking in the heavyweight division that could immediately propel him into meaningful fights in boxing's flagship division after his title tilt against Mormeck.

As normal, promoter Frank Maloney kicked off proceedings,”I'd like to welcome you to the face-to-face to what I think will be a great show at Wembley. We have two great fights in which none of the four men can afford to lose.”

“Tomasz Bonin is the No.11 ranked heavyweight by the WBC. Why does he want to take a risk? Any heavyweight in the top fifteen can fight for a world title. He could sit on his laurels and wait to get picked [for a heavyweight title shot]. If he loses, he's out of the picture.”

“And the British light-heavyweight title fight, we have Tony Oakey who knows that if he loses that he might as well sit on the beach in Portsmouth for the rest of his life and make sandcastles because there is no tomorrow. If Peter Oboh loses, he might as well go back to Nigeria.”

Haye himself continued, “I'm looking forward to the fight, Tomasz Bonin's a very solid fighter who's expected to come out and attack me and use his weight advantage and try to rough me up like Fragomeni did in my last fight. We see this guy is a two or three stone bigger version of Fragomeni. I'll have to be 100% because the shots that cut me against Fragomeni won't cut me [this time], they'll knock me out this time around if I allow myself to be hit.”

“I don't underestimate Bonin at all, I've looked at a lot of his fights, he's very strong, his got a very good chin, he is very durable and I don't expect to take him out early doors. I expect the only way I'll get this guy out of there is if I grind him down over the distance and I see probably a late stoppage.”

Frank Maloney stated that the show is on course to sell 3000 tickets and that the arena will be set up for around 4500. He explained, ”It was a gamble going to Wembley. It's an exciting fight and we wanted to venue to show that David has arrived. It's a risk that David is taking because obviously, if it doesn't sell out, he doesn't get paid as much.”

“I don't bullshit that I really take my hat off to David Haye, he's really throwing the dice with this fight. He's chosen to go to Wembley, he's chosen a hard fight. He's got a world title fight and he could be sat on the beach in Barbados and waited for the world title fight. He hasn't done that, he's gone in with a guy two stone heavier than him. To me, you have to say this boy is putting the excitement back into British boxing."

When discussing the arrangements for the Mormeck title fight, Frank Maloney stated that he wasn't willing to consider giving away options on David Haye so he will wait for the thirty days allotted for private negotiations to expire and attempt to win the purse bids and bring the Mormeck fight to Wembley.

When addressing the subject of his weight, Haye said, “It all changed about a month ago. I was looking at coming in at 16 stone four, but as training has gone on, I realised that this world title fight at cruiserweight is closer than expected so I'm looking at 15 stone five or six now.” Bonin said he would be coming in at 106Kg, which is approximately 16 stone eight pounds.

“So I'm going to come in at as light as possible without the dehydration taking off that last stone because that's where the damage is done to your body. Look at me now, [I'm] cut, I'm at around 7% body fat now and to take off another stone wouldn't be very healthy.”

David is certainly making a statement. Whereas Welsh contemporary Enzo Maccarinelli is coming off an easy one round blowout of an overmatched Bobby Gunn, Haye is taking risks to both further his career and give the public a good show. Hats off to Haye indeed.

Moving onto the Peter Oboh-Tony Oakey clash, Frank Maloney again set the scene,”The British title has been inactive for coming upto three years because no one wants to fight him [Oboh], finally we've got a fight for him, but for three years this man hasn't earned a living.”

When asked why no one wants to fight him Peter responded, ”Because they don't want to get knocked out.”

The Portsmouth man replied, “Well, he ain't stopped me yet, I'll give him that respect. I've trained the best I've ever trained. I respect him as a man and as a champion and it's gonna be a good hard fight but it will be an Oakey win without a shadow of a doubt.” Curiously, even though has words conveyed respect, the way they were spoken clearly carried some prickliness.

Tony continued,”I think he'll [Oboh] agree that the one who loses this fight has to look at their career and see where they're gonna go."

There seemed to be an elevated degree of tension in the air when Oboh wouldn't directly acknowledge that he pulled out of an Oakey fight made six months ago.
Both camps didn't let their frustrations overcome them, but this is a fight which has a certain edge. Hopefully this will translate into good action in the ring.

[Sovereign]

good work ICE, there's also a radio interview with David Haye on BBC sport, check it out. Haye's got superstar written all over him.

[superheavyrhun]

good work ICE, there's also a radio interview with David Haye on BBC sport, check it out. Haye's got superstar written all over him.

I trust that you mean Smashup, but I agree that Haye has all the attributes to be a heavyweight superstar, he's a former model, he's got plenty of power, good sense of humour about himself and he speaks with great confidence without lapsing into abusiveness. Now all he's got to do is make the big fights and win them. Time will tell eh?

I think one of my favourite images of Haye is when he was promoting his last fight, standing on a london street with two handfuls of hay in his fists.