Exclusive – Froch: Haye was defending himself in Chisora brawl

Former two-time British world champion Carl Froch has defended David Haye over his brawl with Dereck Chisora.

Haye clashed with his fellow British heavyweight at a press conference in Munich on Saturday night, shortly after Chisora had lost his world title fight with Vitali Klitschko.

The pair are now the subject of a police investigation and facing bans from the sport but Froch claims Haye was acting in self-defence and blames Chisora, and his team, for the astonishing melee.

Froch told the Alan Brazil Sports Breakfast show: “Chisora shouldn’t have been allowed to get off his seat. He went off the top press table and walked down towards David Haye and as he walked down towards him he was taking his jacket off, almost rolling his sleeves up ready for a fight. What do people expect to happen?

“He should have been stopped and someone should have got between them before they came face to face. David Haye, in my opinion, was defending himself. It’s as simple as that.

“David Haye has got a very loud mouth and you have seen that in the past – that is how he got the fight with Wladimir Klitschko. He shouts, he screams to get his own way and that is fine. He can do what he wants but Chisora decided to get his backside of the seat, walk towards him in a provocative, aggressive manner and that is what sparked what happened. So David Haye is harmless in that sense. What he was doing was harmless.”

Chisora had already slapped Vitali at the pre-fight weigh-in and spat water in the face of his brother and Froch believes the Brit's admirable display in taking the elder Klitschko the distance will now be forgotten as a result of his antics.

“He behaved disgracefully in the build-up to the fight," added the Nottingham fighter. "He conducted himself very well in the ring by the way he went 12 rounds with Vitali, which was a great achievement. He didn’t win many of the rounds but he managed to go the distance with the heavyweight champion of the world. But the scenes after that overshadowed that."