Ricky Hatton should think twice about a return to the ring

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Sport/Pix/pictures/2009/5/3/1241339652498/Ricky-Hatton-001.jpg Ricky Hatton lies on the canvas after being knocked out by Filipino Manny Pacquiao in Las Vegas. Photograph: Gabriel Bouys/AFP/Getty Images The News Of The World reckons Ricky Hatton is coming back - moving up to welterweight again (where he has protested consistently he does not feel strong) against Oscar De La Hoya trial horse, Steve Forbes, in Manchester later in the summer. I hope this is not true. Hatton says now – according to friends talking to the Screws – that his troubled preparation was the reason Manny Pacquiao knocked him out in such disturbing fashion in May. That is delusional. Hatton was beaten – by a smaller man – because his chin has gone. He suspected as much (as was reported here at the time) the moment the quite terrific Cuban light-middleweight Erislandy Lara beat him up in the gym a couple of weeks earlier and was asked to leave. Forbes has no merit as an opponent, apart from padding out Ricky's career. A win over someone who has lost four times in his last six outings will tell him nothing about his future and do little for his standing in the business. But his partner, Jennifer, and son, Campbell, will. Twice now she has shed tears for Hatton at ringside. Hatton would not let Campbell be there last time, fearing the worst. How right he was. He should listen to the people who care about him, not the people are telling him what he wants to hear – like his American business partner, De La Hoya, a fighter who went to the well once too often and just about got away with a regulation beating.