Haye: Parker being ‘trivial’ for skipping bout
Dereck Chisora’s manager has labelled Joseph Parker’s reason for not fighting in London in April as ‘‘trivial’’.
Chisora and Parker were touted as a main event fight for a heavyweight clash at London’s O2 Arena on April 20.
But Parker doesn’t want to take another British fight on short notice and with no contract signed his manager David Higgins has pulled the plug on that date.
Parker was caught short on preparation for his last UK fight and lost a tight bout to Dillian Whyte that was a major setback.
Higgins even accused Chisora of trying to stall Parker to get in extra training himself as he works with his new trainer David Coldwell.
But Chisora’s manager, former world heavyweight champion David Haye, believes Parker should be training while the money men try to finalise the deal.
Haye calculated that Parker was ‘‘about one and a half weeks’’ short.
‘‘It seems like a bit of a trivial reason not to have a big, massive fight in the UK that could really propel both fighters back into title contention,’’ Haye told IFL TV in Britain, speaking for the first time about the stalled negotiations.
He said both Parker and Chisora had given good accounts in losing to Whyte over the back half of last year – Parker went the distance while Chisora suffered an 11th round KO – and it seemed like a natural fight to happen.
‘‘We were hoping they would battle it out to see who moves forward and who doesn’t.’’
Haye said Team Parker had been aware of the potential date for some time, ‘‘just like I have’’.
‘‘When you have a date in mind, you start training,’’ Haye said, adding that he had often not signed contracts until the week of fights during his career because ‘‘there are so many moving parts’’.
‘‘Start training for the fight, don’t wait for the contract’’ was his advice to young fighters and he felt Parker should also take that on board.
He insisted the contractual problems weren’t down to any skulduggery from his side.
Haye is enthused Chisora’s potential about under Coldwell and felt the new trainer could ‘‘freshen things up a bit’’ for the rugged 35-year-old, who has been in the title contender category for some time during a career that now stands at 29 wins and nine losses.
‘‘David is the man to take Dereck Chisora to the next level,’’ Haye told IFL TV, believing his fighter only needed a ‘‘10 to 15 per cent’’ lift in performance to be top level.
Haye said they were working towards the April 20 date.
While Higgins suggested Chisora had been in camp for three weeks already, Haye said Chisora and Coldwell had only been exploring their potential initially and started their specific fight camp last week.