Vicious Right Makes Haye a Double World Champion

David Haye, almost despite himself, became a world champion last night - and is now looking towards what many but his closest friends consider beyond him: the heavyweight championship of the world. He is, for the moment, a double cruiser weight king, having stopped the admirable champion Jean-Mark Mormeck in the seventh of 12 rounds after being deposited on the canvas once himself, and nearly again in the most torrid of exchanges.

He deserves his belts - both the ones around the head landed over his lazy defense and the two strapped around his waist on behalf of the World Boxing Association and the World Boxing Council.

But how close he came to destruction, and not for the first, or probably last, time in his boxing life. Haye is for all sorts of reasons one of the most exciting fighters at work today, inside or outside Britain.

A smattering of British applause greeted Haye's entry, which was low-key even by his laidback standards. He resembled a man out for a Saturday night stroll, a simple white T-shirt covering his chiseled torso. He is growing into a heavyweight, no question.

The place did not exactly go crazy for Mormeck, but the intimacy of the compact arena - a French York Hall in the suburb of Levallois - ensured a good atmosphere. But quite why the referee was afforded a rendition of his Italian national anthem remained unclear.

Mormeck is an interesting character. Apart from the former WBA heavyweight champion Tim Witherspoon, who took seven years to extract $1million he said King owed him and simultaneously saw his career wither on the vine, few fighters have stood up to the promoter so vehemently. He went into this defense of his titles a snarling and bitter man.

King, he said, would have preferred he fight Steve Cunningham - who just happens to be in King's stable. Mormeck was having none of it - and it was a major cause for the delay in staging this contest, which has been dogged from the start. For his stubborn sense of honor alone Haye has reason to be grateful to a decent and proud champion.

'King wanted me to meet him,' the Frenchman from Guadeloupe said. 'He doesn't give a toss whether I win or lose. He'd win which ever way it went. King has got money and he always wants more. He's used to having people at his feet begging him, but I don't do any of that.' Invariably, though, in boxing someone ends up at ground level.

Haye has extraordinarily quick hands for a big man and is less impetuous than when he set out on his professional career - in France, as it happens, just over seven years ago. Haye shaded the first round, snaking his jab though Mormeck's gloves up defense, but took a solid right towards the end. The Londoner countered Mormeck's Frazier-like rushes with right uppercuts and lefts behind his opponent's right elbow, buried hurtfully into the liver. It was an intriguing contrast in styles.

Boxing on the retreat, Haye took a couple of solid whacks to those allegedly suspect chops as he danced along the ropes. Round two to Mormeck.

Haye, left hand low and right resting on his chin, was too easily hit in the early rounds, but shipped the punishment without any noticeable distress. What he needed to do was discourage Mormeck, and that was no easy task.

When Haye first set his cap at this title, he thought he would be going up against the then title-holder O'Neill Bell, who had stopped Mormeck in the 10th round in New York last year to take his titles from him. The Frenchman proved what a resilient man he is, though, when he regained the belts in March, outpointing Bell in a rough, tough battle in this ring.

And Haye found out in the fourth why Mormeck is so feared, a flurry of wicked head shots dropping him in a neutral corner. Haye did not fold but, hands still down, took another barrage at the end of the session. In the fifth, Haye fired back.

Haye's best shots were bouncing off the shaven head of the champion, who rumbled forward like a tank stuck in top gear.

The anxiety at halfway was most definitely in the Haye corner. He needed a big round, a hay maker, to turn the fight.

Mormeck was cautioned for a low blow, but his best punches were high and slamming on to the left side of Haye's head. Haye got his jab working again and a right shook Mormeck. The challenger had restored a small measure of parity, and still looked unshakably confident.

Having weathered a couple of seriously difficult rounds, Haye brilliantly, unexpectedly, came to life with a blizzard that dumped the champion in his own corner midway through the seventh round. The ending was so unexpected it left the audience stunned into a string of muttered 'ooh la las'.

It had not been pretty - nor anywhere near perfect - but Haye had left his calling card on the world stage and was taking home to London, and his pregnant girlfriend, not one but two versions of the world cruiser weight title. Not a bad night's work. His likely next fight, and a much more lucrative one than last night's, will be against WBO cruiserweight champion Enzo Maccarinelli in Cardiff.