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Cometh the hour, cometh the man. Wish someone had told David Haye.
I was one of the lucky ones that travelled over to Belfast to watch the blockbuster Haye Vs Klitschko fight as well as the enthralling men's Wimbledon final in the ‘3D without glasses' experience at iconic Belfast bar, Laverys. I was curious to see the reaction to sports in 3D without glasses and expected to learn quite a lot from the trip. While the fight proved to be a bit of a damp squib (wasn't Haye going to leather him!) the tennis proved emphatically why Djokovic deserves his new world number one ranking! There were some 300 fans packed into Laverys on Saturday evening with the Back Bar rocking as the countdown to the fight began! With most of the pub anticipating the ‘Hayemaker' to make history that night I also ran into two confident-looking German-Klitschko supporters (who knowingly knew their man was about to beat the cocky Londoner). The 3D without glasses TV (they could have done with a bigger screen) was up on the back wall next to a regular HDTV, so you could get a pretty good comparison between the two. I thought the 3D looked pretty ok, it was eerily realistic and particularly good with the slow-motion replays, you could really see the pain in Haye's face... The fight was a tense and nervy affair with the Hayemaker clearly losing round after round but you never know with heavyweights - one punch changes things then it's over. I also noticed more eyes following the 3D TV as the rounds went by. Maybe it takes time to adjust to 3D but it did kind of look better and more interesting - was it just like having ringside seats? Well, almost but better than the HD affair. We all know what happened next, Haye lost by a country-mile and Laverys emptied in about 5 mins leaving the two smiley-Germans, I had met, on their own. As for the 3D-showing it seemed to go down well by accounts. The few people that I spoke to said they had liked what they saw. For me it was definitely worthwhile to see the fight this way - the 3D definitely gives it a different feel or thrill, so well done Sky and Laverys! I came back to Laverys the next day to watch a bit of the tennis but it's not really my thing. Tennis being tennis - attracting a more cultured audience meant Laverys wasn't understandably, as full. It didn't quite have the same atmosphere but there was enough going on. The tennis looked alright and Djokovic went on to win his first SW19 in glorious 3D - hurrah! David Haye made a lot of bold claims before his showdown with Wladimir Klitschko. But come Saturday night he failed to live up to any of them as his dream of unifying the heavyweight division died. All bark and no bite but it did look great in 3D without glasses. -‘Wolfie' on his way back from Belfast 4 July 2011   
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