From the moment his challenge to world champion Nikolai Valuev was first confirmed, David Haye has been unrelenting in his verbal assault upon the Russian boxing behemoth.

Haye was still at it this week, ahead of Saturday's showdown in the historic German city of Nuremberg, when he sneeringly suggested that Valuev "smells like a wet dog".

The 29-year-old Londoner went on: "That's the one part of the fight I'm not looking forward to, getting in the clinches with this big, hairy beast."

Well, I've been as up close and personal as it is possible to get to this 7ft 2ins, 23 stone giant of a man. And I can declare him to be a stink-free zone.

The only stench about this fight has been Haye's lack of respect towards his opponent - remember that appalling tee-shirt he wore displaying the severed heads of the Klitschko brothers?

Valuev has had his ear to the ground and is aware that many British fight fans are uncomfortable with Haye's rhetoric and brashness. He said: "If they don't like the things Haye is saying about me, and if they think he is rude, it shows me that British people are very good people, that they have a good education and good manners."

Haye has also said this of Valuev: "He is the ugliest human being I've ever seen in the flesh. This guy is a freak show."

Not to the group of schoolchildren whose reward for good results in their studies was an audience with the 36-year-old WBA belt-holder at his gym, situated in the shadow of the Olympiastadion in Berlin.

It is true that collective jaws dropped as Valuev hove into view, his body filling a doorway before he ducked that massive, close-shaven head in order to enter the room. But there was nothing freakish about the beaming smile that put those young hearts at ease. And when he delivered a soft-spoken lecture in broken but understandable German on the need to keep working hard at school, Valuev's audience gathered close and hung on his every word.

Valuev believes he has a responsibility to be a role model and regularly makes similar appearances in Russia.

He said: "I must be dignified and behave in a special way. In Russia and in Germany a lot of boys and girls look to me, at what I am doing and what I am saying. So I have to act in a good way, to set an example."

Valuev may be big but he ain't stupid. Recalling his formative years at school in St Petersburg, he described how he regularly dipped into Tolstoy and Chekov. Speaking through a translator, Valuev explained: "They help develop me and my life. I read a lot of your Arthur Conan Doyle. You know, Sherlock Holmes. And HG Wells."

He wooed his wife Galya, mother of the couple's two young children, with poetry he penned himself. And he often trains to the strains of classical music.

For relaxation, Valuev reaches for a fishing rod or a shotgun. "Hunting is my hobby," he said. "I fish everything that is swimming in the water, and I hunt everything that is flying in the air and stepping through the woods."

He flashed that smile again, and added: "But I hunt only those fish and animals that I'm allowed to."

Does that include loose-tongued Englishmen? Valuev, sitting on a ring apron, leaned back on the ropes and contemplated a suitable reply. "If you want to equate hunting with boxing," he said, "then in both you need patience, composure, and the ability to wait for the right moment to strike."

That is bad news for Haye, who has hinted that his tactic will be to goad Valuev into an up-tempo encounter that will suit the Briton's greater speed.

Since switching trainers to the diminutive Alexander Zimin, former coach of the Soviet Union Olympic team, in the wake of his sole defeat to southpaw Ruslan Chagaev in April 2007, Valuev has added skills working on the inside to his established long range jab.

"Technically, I am much better," he added. "And I will fight my fight against Haye. I know just what I have to do."

That suggests Valuev will be in it for the long haul, wearing Haye out by crowding and holding him, clutching him to that hairy chest where the only scent may be that of the challenger's fear.