"Of course I remember, Billy Graham says quietly as he pushes back his straw trilby to show me his wounded expression. I can remember everything. Graham, who trained Ricky Hatton for all but the last three of his 48 fights, used to sit with his fighter on the grimy steps outside their first boxing gym in Salford in the late 1990s. It was a more innocent time and, rather than being called The Preacher and The Hitman, they were just Billy and Ricky then."
"But, even when reminiscing, The Preacher can't escape the fact that, this weekend, it will be exactly three months since his lost friend is thought to have taken his own life at the age of 46. On 14 September, Hatton's body was found at home, in Hyde, six miles from where we sit now in Mossley, on the outskirts of Manchester."
"For weeks there was an outpouring of grief and love for Hatton in Manchester and boxing. The pain continues, privately, among the fighter's family and friends. But a national story brought a sobering acceptance that such glory and fervour will not return soon to boxing in this country. It is hard to imagine a fighter today being able to conjure up the magic which Hatton once created. Tens of thousands of fans, most of whom considered themselves personal friends of The Hitman,"
Billy Graham recalls training Ricky Hatton from Salford gym steps in the late 1990s and guiding him through most of his 48 fights. Hatton rose to mass adulation as a wise-cracking, ferocious, urchin-faced boxer whose tens of thousands of fans followed him to Las Vegas. Hatton's body was found at home in Hyde on 14 September and he was thought to have taken his own life at 46. Manchester and the boxing community produced an outpouring of grief while his family and friends grieve privately. Many see his death as the end of a unique era in British boxing.
Read at www.theguardian.com
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]