By Elliot Foster

London - Former two division world champion David Haye (28-2, 26KOs) continued his conquest to a heavyweight title with two round demolition over previously undefeated Arnold Gjergjaj (29-1, 21KOs), who went down four times. Haye now moves forward with a fall showdown against former WBO champion Shannon Briggs, who saw a quick victory on the undercard.

Within the first forty seconds, a hard right hand sent 'The Cobra' down on his back. He didn't seem to hurt, but he was being buckled by every shot that landed.  Gjergjaj become defensive and put up a high guard to avoid Haye's incoming big shots. He went down again at the end of the first from a right hand, but it was waved off by the referee.

At the start of the second round, a hard left jab from Haye sent Gjergjaj went down for a third time. He once again got up, but Haye started battering him against the ropes and sent him down for a fourth time. This time the referee waved off the contest. It was Haye's second fight of the year since snapping a near four year layoff.

ON THE UNDERCARD

Shannon Briggs made a quick-fire return to the ring.

The former WBO world heavyweight champion was in the squared circle for less than three minutes as he set up a clash with tonight’s bill-topper David Haye.

Briggs is now 60-6-1 (53 KOs) after stopping vastly overmatched Emilio Ezequiel Zarate inside a round, exclusively live on UKTV channel Dave, at London’s O2 Arena.

Zarate, from Argentina, dropped to 20-17-3 (11 KOs) following defeat, having taken the fight on extremely short notice.

He was in survival mode from the very beginning and was floored in the opening stages of the fight by a cracking right hand.

However, he made it up and looked ready to continue. But Briggs put an end to proceedings a short time later and, having waited for an opening, uncorks a monstrous left hook to the body, which sent Zarate sprawling across the canvas and forced the referee to count him out.

Briggs was originally set to fight Alexander Dimitrenko and then Jakov Gospic over the 10-round distance, but then Zarate –– who was stopped in two rounds by world-ranked heavyweight Hughie Fury back in November –– was drafted in and lasted just two minutes and 22 seconds.

Lee Markham ground out a victory in what was a cracking fight.

The former WBO European super-middleweight title challenger outpointed Joe Mullender at London’s O2 Arena, as part of the undercard to David Haye’s clash against Arnold Gjergjaj.

Markham came out on top in what was a battle of solid hooks and uppercuts from both men and, after bloodying his opponent’s face at the end of the first quarter of the fight, went on to take the fight away from Mullender down the stretch to pick up the vacant English middleweight belt.

Both fighters took a lot of punishment throughout the duration of the 10-round showdown, but it was Markham who got the nod after a gruelling fight, taking it by margins of 97-93, 98-93 and 97-94.

Earlier in the card, millionaire nightclub owner Joe Fournier moved to 4-0 (4 KOs) with a dazzling display against Hungarian opposition.

Fournier had his opponent down twice in the second round, after unleashing a barrage of shots in the opener, before the referee, Jeff Hinds, called a halt to the clash with Bela Juhasz after one minute and 42 seconds of the round.

Meanwhile, Nick Webb, now 6-0 (5 KOs), remained unbeaten with a points victory over Hari Miles, who slipped to 9-10 (2 KOs).

And Ollie Pattison (4-0) and Daniel Keenan (2-0) have both scored four-round points wins over Bryan Wain (0-9) and Dwayne Sheldon (0-3) respectively.

But it wasn’t so straightforward for Floyd Moore (14-6-1), who squeezed past Yordan Vasilev (18-43-2, 4 KOs) on points.

The Portsmouth fighter was decked in the third round against his Bulgarian opponent but regrouped enough to take the clash on the card of the referee by 58 points to 56.