Ain't no stopping Haye now

It's prediction time... and three of our four panelists are backing David Haye to deliver what he's promised all along.

The Panel deliver their definitive big-fight verdicts

Haye v Klitschko is the biggest fight boxing has seen for years. It brings together two world heavyweight champions and three world titles and has been the talk of the sport since it was made. Fighters past and present have been giving their predictions and the Sky Sports Box Office HD team are no different. But before Jim Watt, Barry McGuigan, Glenn McCrory and Johnny Nelson take their place at the Imtech Arena, we have got them to dissect everything we've seen. And with hours to go before Haye's moment of truth, there's only one thing left to do... it's prediction time!

Glenn McCrory

Safety-first was the right way for Haye to box against Nikolai Valuev but I think he is going to be a lot more explosive in this. I know it wasn't much of a fight in the end, but the way he got to Audley Harrison and rattled him from the off is what's needed here. David is hits ferociously hard, gets his combinations off quickly and if Wladimir is rattled, there's a great possibility he will panic - and that is what David needs. When Klitschko panics he will stiffen up and he won't be able to do his work. You might sneer at the Audley comparison but he was a big lump with a decent jab and one obvious danger punch. David has the speed to get past that jab and hit Klitschko with three or four punches - and that's what he's got to do. The speed is key here because we have seen Wladimir deal with big lumbering heavyweights for years and he has nailed the lot of them. And don't get me wrong, if Klitschko gets into that rhythm he will just wear David down, systematically dismantle him and then, you are looking another of those trademark late stoppages. I would love David to pull it off, I really would. And I do think he's got a real, real chance if he does jump on him, catch him by surprise and upset the rhythm. It will need to be spectacular, as Johnny says, but if we know anything about David Haye it is that he does spectacular and he does it very well. But if he gets it wrong, he'll just be ground down like the rest of them. When these fights come about I usually spend the first three weeks fearing for our guy, the next three weeks thinking his going to win and the last week or so thinking he's going to lose! But this time the closer it gets, the more I can see David doing it. Don't forget David is not a namby-pamby fighter, he is a real gun-slinger. He might be a good-looking lad, he might speak well and he might be heading for Hollywood, but this is a tough kid from Bermondsey who is not scared of a fight. And not scared of who he is fighting. That is the sort of guy that will take a gamble and pull it off. So I am going for the knockout and I am going to go for inside four rounds. If he doesn't do it then, Klitschko will be starting to get into his stride. And we as fight fans, do not want to see that.

Johnny Nelson

I think David Haye will go out to get him, jump on him, upset him. He is already the bad guy, the villain in all this and I think he should carry that on. I would fight dirty, even prepare to have a poin taken off for hitting low, do anything he can inside and on the blindside to annoy Klitschko. Klitschko is like a robot, he sticks to a gameplan and does it very well, but if one card comes down, they all come tumbling after it. Getting inside that jab is the problem. Klitschko keeps popping it out, takes it down to the body and then drags it back up, but the one thing David has more than any of Wladimir's previous opponents is speed. He is quciker than Corrie Sanders and he is quick enough to get past that long arm and he has to find his way inside it. If he steps back he is immediately giving his man ground and doing that will let Wladimir slip into his comfort zone and when you let such a good defensive fighter in that comfort zone, you are asking for trouble. He also has to, on his way in, try and tease the shots out of Wladimir, so he can slip them, then jump in with two, three, four shots. We have seen so many other guys try and take Klitschko out with one big, single shot and we know it doesn't work. David needs to hurt him when he can as often as he can because it is a big risk getting past that jab; if he gets it wrong by a fraction of a second, he'll get picked off for sure. I'd say David is the one most likely to get the stoppage win, but if he does put Klitschko down, he needs to make sure he's sleeping because believe me, they will give him every chance they can to win this fight. And even if he is flat on his back out cold, the 10 count is going to be one of the longest you'll see for a long time! If David is going to knock him out he needs to do it in the first six rounds -and I think he will. If he doesn't, it'll be Klitschko on points.

Barry McGuigan

David is ostensibly an attacking fighter - he doesn't box defensively. He boxed on the retreat against Nikolai Valuev, but he was a behemoth of a man, he was immobile and ponderous, and they knew that if they backed off and stepped left and stepped right, he was going to have to chase him and close the ring down. If for example, he drops Klitschko in the first round and puts the fear of God into him and Klitschko holds his punches and thinks about defence all the time and David is on the front foot, backing him up, throwing combinations to the body and head, keeping him on the back foot, throwing lots of punches, of course he can win on points. But if it's a close fight, that's the real concern. David is not a quantity puncher, he's a quality puncher. If you are an attacking fighter, you normally throw your punches in bunches but that's not his forte. He likes to pick out his shots; jab, then throw that right hand. Against Audley Harrison when he had him out on his feet, then he started to throw them in bunches, but he was still looking for that one big shot. Something in my stomach tells me that David's going to beat him up and knock him out. I don't think it can happen early in the fight or late on as well. The later it goes the more tired he will become - especially if it's a physical fight - and the law of averages says David doesn't like long fights. His power's early, 90 per cent of his knockouts happen early. As the fight goes on and if he's getting caught and hasn't got the upper hand, the chances are he'll get tired, get lethargic and maybe his defence will drop and Klitschko can knock down a mountain with that big right hand. We know that, so we can't eliminate that but I'm sick to death of people sitting on fences and I'm sick to death of pundits saying it might go this way, or it might go that way. Stand up and be counted! I'm standing up to be counted and I feel that David Haye is going to win and I feel that it is going to be by knockout. Whether it's in the eighth, seventh, sixth, fifth, fourth, third or second, I don't know. But I do know he's going to win.

Jim Watt

All the pressure is on Klitschko here, not David Haye. Has beaten people up and has been a tremendous heavyweight champion but through no fault of his own, there haven't been the level of opponents to give him a legacy beyond this. There's been no Mike Tyson, no Muhammad Ali, no Larry Holmes, not even a Tim Witherspoon. It's not Wladimir's fault he's spent most of his career being better than everbiody else, but there is a very real danger that if he doesn't win - never mind if he gets knocked out - that when we think about him, this is what we will remember. That adds pressure, but I wouldn't have expected him to make mistakes anyway, let the red mist descend. German audiences are the best boxing audiences in the world; all they want from their fighters is the win. They don't care if it's awful, they don't care if it's boring and they don't care if it's dull, as long as their man gets the win. That has always helped the Klitschkos because there has never been any need for them to be exciting, they can afford to be as cautious as they want, providing they get the right result. If when I have no choice and I have to put my house on it, that's where I find it harder to make a case for Haye. if you're talking about putting it all on one man, you would have to go with the proven heavyweight - and that of course, is Klistchko. There's pressure on him, but he's boxing 'at home' and he's done this so many times before. He is big and athletic and technically very good - in fact the only phsyical advantage Haye is going to have is speed. We all talk about Klitschko getting knocked out but he punches just as hard, so don't think he's any more vulnerable. Yes he's been put down 11 times, but he has been put down by heavyweights. David, remember, has been put down by cruiserweights. We don't really know about David's stamina, but we do know Klitschko is a great boxer and a great athlete. If Haye decides to frustrate him, moves around him and makes him work, he will probably have to fall behind on the scorecards and you don't want to be doing that, because you can't be sure of knocking him out late. And that's too big a risk to take. He doesn't want to let Klitschko take control so I wonder if the plan will be to go looking for the opportunities to score that knock out. Then you have to ask yourself can Haye win on points? Remember we all thought he would knock out, or be knocked out by Valuev, and nobody but nobody saw a points win, yet look what happened. I am not so sure he could fight that way against Klitschko, in Germany, and get the verdcit - I just can't see him getting that sort of verdict here. Klitschko has to be the favourite here. If he is behind on the cards but he just can't make any inroads or get close to landing those big shots, Haye knows how to go into damage limitation - and we all know Klitschko would be happy to get control, leave it at that and let the fight fizzle out. He's not the type to go looking to blast anyone out, although Haye has upset him more than anyone we've seen. It's by no means the only outcome I can see, but I would have to say Klitschko on points. But... if David does go and get the win, it will be huge. Maybe not right away, but remember Lennox Lewis wasn't really appreciated while he boxed, but is held in much higher esteem now. David isn't as nice a guy as Lennox and the public don't really warm to him in the same way, but if he can win this it will be as good as anything Lennox achieved, believe me.