Harrison and Haye, can’t they just get along?
This weekend’s fight between WBA heavyweight world champion David Haye and Audley Harrison is being billed as “The Best of Enemies” but at one time these two were the best of friends.
If you go back ten years the duo had a blossoming relationship which saw Haye looking up to the newly crowned Olympic gold medallist as something of a role model.
Harrison is eight years Hayes senior and “The Hayemaker” spent a lot of time with “A-Force”, who had become the nation’s darling following his gold medal. They had known each other since their amateur days and as well as training they were partying and hanging out together.
However, as Haye grew as a cruiserweight Harrison fell as heavyweight, in some ways Haye learnt from Harrison’s mistakes. Like A-force, Haye learned to talk himself up to attract interest and also set up his own promotions company to turn a bigger profit. However, unlike Harrison Haye recognised the importance of steady management and focus to create a sustainable product. Harrison failed to think long term and failed to hold his audience’s attention.
It has been interesting to see the two in the build-up to this fight. They are going to talk up this rivalry as much as possible because it sells tickets, but rumours have also persisted that the two were seen enjoying lunch together and have been laughing and joking when the cameras are off.
Their falling out is a murky beast with no one there to clarify exactly what happened. There has been talk of a sparring session where Haye went a bit over the top and also the time just after Harrison had lost to Danny Williams and wanted to go on one of Hayes undercards and Haye refused.
Who knows what really happened and maybe this is just a hatred of convenience. It’s cynical to think that way but boxing is a highly cynical sport and while they may no longer be brother-like close perhaps the feud doesn’t run as deep as they are letting on.
Against Nicolay Valuev, Haye got one of his stooges to turn up at the press conference in a ghoulish mask, when he was due to fight Wladimir Klitschko he got a t-shirt made of him beheading the Ukrainian brothers. Against Harrison it’s been more playful joshing than anything, which suggests he’s held back a bit because, let’s face it, if you wanted to stick the boot into A-force it would be very easy.
On Saturday at the end of the fight we will know for sure just how well these two get along.
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