Nikolai Valuev vs. David Haye would agree to face Ruiz in a mandatory defence. Confirmed bouts: Nikolai Valuev vs. David Haye Nikolai Valuev vs. David Haye, billed as "David vs Goliath", was a professional boxing match contested on 7 November 2009 for the WBA heavyweight championship. After regaining the WBA title with a unanimous decision over fellow former Champion John Ruiz Nikolai Valuev had made one defence gaining a very controversial majority decision over Evander Holyfield, he agreed to "Champion in Recess" Ruslan Chagaev, who had given Valuev the only defeat of career. However their fight on 30 May 2009 in Helsinki, Finland at the
Nikolai Valuev vs. Evander Holyfield narrowly missed making history by winning his fifth world title and becoming the oldest heavyweight champion in boxing history (surpassing George Foreman) and instead lost to Valuev by a closely contested, and disputed, majority decision. Holyfield kept his distance from Valuev for most of the fight but appeared to clearly outpunch Valuev, who did not sustain much offense during the fight. Nevertheless, when the fight went to the official scorecards, two judges had Valuev winning by scores of 115–114 (six rounds to five, one even) and 116–112 (eight rounds to four), while the third had the fight even at 114–114