Pacquiao Wins By Second Round Knock out

What first seemed a long battle ahead in the first round quickly turned into a one sided battle for team Pacquiao. The first few minutes had a few punches exchanged but late in the first round Pacquiao landed a right hook which shocked the British sluggers stance. A follow up combination from Pacquiao drove hatton to the corner and he eventually felt the power of pacmans punches.

The second round was a beautiful display of Pacquiaos skills. His punches went straight to Hattons face and an left uppercut sent the british boxer out cold in the ground. Pacquiao proved once and for all that he is the greatest boxer to date and he deserves the title of pound for pound king.

Congratulations Manny Pacquiao, you have achieved a lot and what most boxers could only dream of. You have made boxing history and the Filipino people is proud of you and all of the boxing fans are proud of you.

Pacquiao and Hatton ready for Vegas boxing spotlight

LAS VEGAS, Nevada (AFP) — Manny Pacquiao avoided Manila's distracting delights to train in Hollywood so he could better focus upon what he needs to do to win Saturday's showdown fight with England's Ricky Hatton.

After working out for weeks next door to a Thai restaurant where he would eat dinner, the Filipino boxing star has found his focus and is confident he can become a champion in a record-matching sixth different weight division.

"If that happens, people will look at me as my name is on the list with the greatest legends in boxing history and that will be my legacy," Pacquiao said.

"It's very important to me to win six. It's a big honor for my country."

Pacquiao, 48-3 with two drawn and 36 knockouts, and Hatton, 45-1 with 32 knockouts, are set to make their arrivals in Las Vegas on Tuesday to begin the final countdown for a highly anticipated junior welterweight title bout.

"Right now I'm ready to fight. My mind is very complete. I'm into the fight," Pacquiao said. "I can focus more in Hollywood than the Philippines. If I train in the Philippines there are lots of activities, invitations, events."

Hatton has a size advantage while Pacquiao will count upon his superior speed to conquer the Hitman from Manchester, the linear division champion who has never lost at junior welterweight and fights for his own claim on history.

"As long as I'm remembered as one of the best we've ever had. I would be quite content," Hatton said. "People see me as excited in the ring and a good guy to boot. That?s how I'd like to be remembered."

Hatton suffered his only loss in Las Vegas when now-retired Floyd Mayweather stopped him in 2007 in a welterweight fight for the "pound-for-pound" crown now seen as belonging to Pacquiao after his victory over retired Oscar de la Hoya.

"This is the second time I've challenged the front pound-for-pound number one fighter," Hatton said. "We haven't had too many British fighters that could say they were the number one pound-for-pound fighter.

"To be mentioned in some of the same breath as some of Britain?s boxing heroes, that would be spectacular."

Thousands of noisy supporters flocked to Vegas for the Mayweather fight, creating a raucous atmosphere more like a Premiership match than a typical US title bout, singing and chanting for hours at the weigh-in as well.

"I would like to think I've brought some of the best atmosphere fights that Vegas has seen in recent years," Hatton said. "I don't think anybody has drawn an atmosphere and a fan base like that over to the United States."

Hatton knows it's vital he fight better than he fared against Mayweather in his biggest prior fight.

"Well, it?s very important because if I perform like I did last time, I'll get beat again," Hatton said.

Pacquiao has pressure of a different type, stressing that he fights for the honor of his nation. For a man whose bouts silence the weapons of Filipino soldiers, the tension is huge.

"The pressure is there but I don't want to put in my mind anything about that," Pacquiao said. "I want to focus on the work and try to make people happy with my performance."

Pacman Prepares for the Battle

At Manny Pacquiao’s present peak - idolised by Filipinos throughout the world and considered to be boxing’s best pound-for-pound exponent before next weekend’s £50m superfight against the Hitman from Manchester, Ricky Hatton - it would be easy to disregard how his long journey began. Before he made his American debut in 2001 on the undercard of a bout involving Oscar de la Hoya, the Golden Boy whom he beat into retirement four months ago in Las Vegas, “PacMan” was another obscure fighter from Asia, an alphabet world title-holder and talented, but easily overlooked by the big players in his sport’s traditional, more lucrative strongholds.

Not that Pacquiao was deterred by indifference. On the streets of Manila, homeless and penniless, he had encountered much worse. Speaking inside his new workplace, the Wild Card Boxing Gym in Hollywood, he says: “Before I got to Manila I worked as a baker back in Bukidnon. I was a child but it was the only way I could put bread on the table for my family. In Manila I was on my own and had to work to survive. I worked in construction, painted houses and sewed clothes in a factory and all the time I trained to be a fighter. Other people may forget this but I will never forget. This is what drives me to be the champion I am for my people.”

This explains why his apartment near the gym has been occupied by more than 20 people at a time over the past couple of months (a conservative count) with sleeping bags spread out across the floor each night right up to his bedroom door.

Pacquiao, brought up a Catholic and still deeply religious, takes his faith and his position as a standard-bearer for his people seriously. Even strangers who turn up at his home in General Santos City in the south of the Philippines, which they do incessantly, looking for money and food parcels, are never turned away from his door. “God has given me a gift and it is my duty to share the fruits of this gift with my people,” he says.

Freddie Roach, his trainer, often shakes his head in despair that Pacquiao could end up penniless through simple acts of generosity. Members of Team Pacquiao, the entourage who surround the boxer, can pocket $3,000 from their little cash cow this afternoon just by weighing in at 10% less than they did when training camp began.

Pacquiao is preparing to go to war for the 53rd time in a career in which he has secured 47 wins, 35 by stoppage, losing three fights and drawing two. He has boxed only once at lightweight - 9st 9lb - against the durable David Diaz and once more at welterweight - 10st 7lb - when he beat the carcass of De la Hoya, so his assault on the light-welterweight (10st) division which Hatton still rules will yield no automatic conquest, given that he began his career in 1995 as a 7st 8lb light-flyweight. “Speed will be very important in this fight,” Pacquiao declared, echoing the sentiments of Roach, who has predicted that Hatton will not last beyond the third round. “I expect Ricky Hatton to be 100% committed and fast and strong, and I know he has a very strong left hand, which I have to be careful about. But I am the better boxer and boxing is psychological - the quickness of your mind can make all the difference. I have been defeated before, so I know what it is like, but a lot of people in the Philippines are willing me to win and praying for me. The guns are silent in the street every time I fight. There is no fighting, no crime. I would fight every day just for my people, if the guns will stay silent. These are the thoughts I carry to the r i n g a n d t h e y a r e p o w e r f u l thoughts. I am not trying to win this fight alone.”

Hatton, beaten only once in 46 fights and never at light-welterweight, does not walk alone himself, though some prefight assessments of Pacquiao’s prowess have persuaded the Mancunian to suggest that he ought to be making way for Godzilla, so apathetic is the fight crowd when considering his chances. “People are looking at the Oscar performance and suggesting that Pacquiao will finish my career, too, but he won’t,” Hatton says. “Oscar was like a walking corpse that night but I have plenty left in the tank. Manny is in for one hell of a shock when he realises just how much boxing ability and hand speed I have. I can fight going backwards, too, and I know he can’t. He does all of his punching on the front foot. He shuffles in and out constantly but when he punches he’s always coming forward. He doesn’t get leverage on the back foot and, in order to punch on his front foot, he will have to come into my territory.

“Everyone expected Paulie Malignaggi to out-jab and outspeed me last November but I was the one beating him to the punch and dominating. Pacquiao has improved his technique over the years but he’s as easy to hit now as he’s always been and he’s been shaken up several times and stopped twice by body shots. If a couple of flyweights have been able to stop him, what do you think I’ll be able to do, the biggest man he will ever have faced outside of Oscar?”

Alas, little big men come no bigger than Pacquiao, whose swarming attack is “like a typhoon from across the Pacific”. American TV analyst Larry Merchant coined the phrase. Hatton will get to know the feeling.

TALE OF THE TAPE
Ricky Hatton, inset Record46 wins, 1 defeat, 32 KOs Age30Height5ft 7½inReach65in StrengthsCan dominate most opponents physically at 63.5kg (10st); unbeaten as a light-welterweight; body punches WeaknessesVulnerable to speed and susceptible under pressure; waning punch resistance; struggles against southpaws; cuts Manny Pacquiao Record48 wins, 3 defeats, 2 draws, 36 KOs Age30Height5ft 6½inReach67in StrengthsFootwork; hand speed; southpaw stance; straight left hand to chin WeaknessesVulnerable to body punches; questionable chin; tendency to overreach

Amir Khan accepts he may have to face Ricky Hatton at some stage

The prospect of a clash between Ricky Hatton and Amir Khan has always seemed remote, but Khan admitted for the first time yesterday that a bout between Britain’s two best-known active boxers could happen one day.

Khan challenges Andreas Kotelnik for the WBA light-welterweight title, a belt once held by Hatton, at the O2 arena, southeast London, on June 27. But stepping up to Hatton’s division and winning a world title could put the 22-year-old on a collision course with the man he regards as a friend and hero.

“Ricky is a good friend, but it’s sport so sometimes friends have to fight each other to find out who’s the best in the division,” Khan said. “But I’d rather have him in my corner supporting me in my big fights than be against me. It will be interesting to see what happens after this.”

The bout would become more likely if Khan beats Kotelnik and Hatton loses to Manny Pacquiao, whom he faces in Las Vegas on May 2. Like Pacquiao, Khan is trained in Los Angeles by Freddie Roach. Khan flies to the United States tomorrow and revealed that he will be in Las Vegas next week training alongside Pacquiao.

“Freddie wanted me to go to Las Vegas so he can finish Manny’s camp and then start mine,” Khan said.

“Manny and Ricky are both friends, but I’m just going to stay neutral and enjoy the fight.”

ITV will screen Carl Froch’s WBC super-middleweight title defence against Jermain Taylor on Sunday night. It will be shown on ITV4 at 8.30pm and again on ITV1 at 11.15pm. There has been outrage in boxing circles after no British broadcaster bid for the rights to screen the bout live, which takes place in the early hours of Sunday at Foxwoods Casino in Mashantucket, Connecticut.

- To watch the bout live in the UK, it will be available on the internet for £9.95 on www.frochvtaylor.com and there will be live commentary on BBC Radio 5 Live.

Hatton-Pacquiao tickets sold out

The Ricky Hatton-Manny Pacquiao world junior welterweight championship match on May 2 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas has officially sold out, the card's promoters announced Tuesday.

The Garden Arena has a seating capacity of 17,157 but holds just over 16,000 when it is configured for boxing.

Tickets for the Hatton-Pacquiao event ranged from $1,000 (for ringside seats) to $150. There was a two-ticket limit per person for tickets priced $150, and a limit of 10 for the other prices ($1,000, $750, $500 and $300).

Closed circuit tickets are still available at Mandalay Bay, Mirage, TI, Monte Carlo, Circus Circus, Luxor and New York-New York.

The championship bout will be produced and distributed by HBO Pay-Per-View beginning at 9 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. PT.

After Hatton, Pacquiao groomed to fight Cotto

Bob Arum swears he is not looking past Ricky Hatton, but the Hall of Fame promoter already has a big-named opponent lined up for Filipino star Manny Pacquiao, who is set to rumble with the brash Briton on May 2 in Las Vegas.

“Miguel Cotto,” Arum told the Bulletin over lunch at Manila Hotel Friday hours after arriving from the US.

Arum said Cotto, a native of Puerto Rico, is fighting Joshua Clottey of Ghana on June 13 at Madison Square Garden in New York, and Pacquiao himself has told him that meeting Cotto is tops in his mind.

“We can do it at Madison Square Garden,” said Arum, noting that Pacquiao will be at ringside when Cotto squares off with Clottey in the Big Apple.

However, Arum reveals that should a fight with Cotto happen, it will not take place until late-November.

“Manny told me that after this one (with Hatton), he would be available to fight next in late-November,” said Arum, who is in town to preside over Sunday morning’s double world championship fight at the Araneta Coliseum featuring flyweight champion Nonito Donaire and light-fly title challenger Brian Viloria.

Arum cited that Hatton could pose problems for Pacquiao and while “anything can happen in boxing, (but) “speed kills and nine out of ten, speed wins as in any other sport.”

Besides, Arum rationalizes, “Hatton can’t fight southpaws.”

Arum said Pacquiao’s left-handed stance and his lightning-fast hands would mess up Hatton that the fight will end in the same manner Pacquiao won over David Diaz.

“Pacquiao figures to win and Pacquiao figures to win big,” said Arum, a seventy-something Harvard-educated lawyer from New York.

“Manny and Freddie have all this figured out.”

Told that the now-retired Floyd Mayweather Sr. appears to be the right choice for a post-Hatton fight, Arum said this early that “Mayweather wants “60 percent” of the revenue and “I feel right now that Manny deserves the bigger percentage because he is the star.”

Another option is for Pacquiao to battle Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. “in a catchweight of 150 lbs,” said Arum.

'New Hatton' boasts of quickness, power

MANILA, Philippines - If you think Manny Pacquiao is fast, wait till you see Ricky Hatton.

The new Ricky Hatton.

In the first episode of HBO’s Pacquiao vs. Hatton 24/7, a four-part, four-week series that gave the cable giant all the access it needed to cover the training of the two boxers, Hatton has displayed quickness never seen from him before.

Under the guidance of his new trainer, Floyd Mayweather Sr., Hatton believes that the only way to beat Pacquiao is to match his speed. According to British superstar, no one, not even Pacquiao, can match his power at 140 lbs.

“It was a case of, after seven weeks in training camp, ‘bang, look at me, a new fighter,’” Hatton said in a Times Online article that came out yesterday.

“It has been miles better this time with Floyd,” added Hatton, in the last three weeks of training at the IBA Gym in Las Vegas, the same gym Pacquiao uses when he’s there.

“The more time you spend with him, you get used to him. I’m faster now than how I was at the end of the last training camp,” said Hatton, in his second fight under Mayweather.

The Times Online article added that Hatton, under Mayweather, has given a little on strengthening (which he’d always done under Billy Graham), and has focused on “speed and sharpness.”

The HBO series, which came off the racks the other day, showed Hatton in training, trying to develop and hone his speed.

But Pacquiao doesn’t believe that 10, 12 or 13 weeks of training under Mayweather can change or make Hatton a new fighter.

“Sa tingin ko ‘yun pa din ‘yung Hatton na makakalaban ko (I think it’s the same Hatton I’d be up against),” said Pacquiao in recent interviews.

And that’s the Hatton he knows, always there in front of you, moving in, trying to wrestle his opponent. The British superstar is notorious for holding and hitting, and may work like an octopus.

“Hindi naman nila mababago ang style nila ganoon kabilis (They can’t change their style overnight),” said Pacquiao, still confident that come May 2, at the MGM Grand, Hatton will always be one step behind.

- By Abac Cordero (Philstar News Service, www.philstar.com)