Boxing: Ricky Hatton must wipe the slate clean

RICKY Hatton is the most amiable, admirable human being you would ever wish to meet. He is also a fool.

I was lucky enough to spend many, many hours with him as I ghostwrote his autobiography The Hitman four years ago. And it was a pleasure to be in his company.

He is funny, generous and warm-hearted. His loveable character was one of the reasons why the British public adored him. He was the boy next door who became the light-welterweight world

champion and five years ago dismantled one of the modern-day greats, Kostya Tszyu.

But defeat to Manny Pacquiao 16 months ago seems to have unleashed a different Ricky Hatton. He always loved a pint or six when at the height of his powers, yet he was an agreeable drinker

who always went tee-total when a big fight loomed.

Now there are no limits to Ricky’s drinking and he has started seeking pleasures in other ways, namely cocaine.

We spoke about drugs for Ricky’s book and he admitted he wouldn’t even know what cocaine looked like. Back then, I believed him. Now it seems he is intent on hoovering a filthy drug, which

causes untold misery, up his hooter. He should be ashamed.

Ricky was born into a close working-class family in Manchester. His mum, dad and brother – Carol, Ray and Matthew – must be mortified.

He stopped listening to his loved ones long ago and has chosen to spend vast amounts of his personal wealth on the drug-dealing vermin who targeted him. The tragedy is that he has so much

for which to live.

He has a burgeoning gym, a raft of talented fighters under his promotional wing and a public who know a hero when they see one. Instead, he is tossing away his money and his marbles on

industrial quantities of cocaine and crate-loads of booze.

The life of an ex-boxer cannot be an easy one as they are the macho kings of the ring who often struggle to cope with the world outside the ropes. Look at Frank Bruno, or Joe Calzaghe.

The bell has tolled on Ricky’s boxing career and what he needs to do is listen to his family, get clean and start being Ricky Hatton again.

Then the swine who sold him drugs can scuttle off to the next target while Ricky reverts to his former self – an inspirational kid from the streets who became a star.

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