Ricky Hatton can reflect on his career with pride having faced the best and won world championships in two-weight divisions, but the nature of his loss to Floyd Mayweather in December 2007 still rankles.
Hatton says he can’t help feeling ‘a bit cheated’ after referee Joe Cortez continually broke up the action whenever the Mancunian hero looked to work Mayweather over on the inside and unleash his vaunted bodywork. The Brit was eventually stopped in the 10th round of a frustrating night.
Cortez’s performance was certainly ‘intrusive’ to put it mildly. Hatton had aimed to emulate Jose Luis Castillo’s first showing against ‘Money’ where the Mexican pushed Mayweather to the brink with torrid pressure and in-fighting.
Photo: Peter Byrne/Press Association.
“I did give [Mayweather] a good run for his money,” Hatton told BT Sport. “I feel a little bit cheated to be honest with you, because I felt that I wasn’t going to outbox him and I wasn’t going to outspeed him.
“But, if I was allowed to get close, I would definitely throw more punches than him. But I never got the opportunity and that’s the thing that will always eat away at me – the referee never gave me the opportunity.
“The one person that was allowed to get stuck in and bully him and was allowed to fight close was Marcos Maidana and he pushed him really close.
“Castillo was allowed to get close and a lot of people thought Castillo won! So I smelt a rat that night with the referee and I don’t think I was given a fair crack of the whip.”
Yet Hatton still looks back fondly on a night where hordes of British fight fans descended on Vegas to support the Manchester boxing icon against arguably the greatest fighter of recent times.
“It was incredible and I wish I could go back in a time machine and just go in the bar and have a beer with the fans and walk down the strip and listen to all the songs,” recalled Hatton.
“Everyone I speak to say it was the best weekend of their lives. And that’s not just one or two people. I’ve had hundreds of people say that to me so it must have been one hell of a weekend.
“When you see fans saying that to you, it can’t be such a bad thing – even though it ended in defeat. And [Mayweather] will probably go down as the greatest of all-time so you can’t have too much to complain about.”
Main image: Peter Byrne/Press Association.