Ricky Hatton reveals he contemplated suicide and cried all day in mental health battle after Floyd Mayweather defeat

RICKY HATTON has revealed how he contemplated suicide and cried all day after his defeat to Floyd Mayweather.

The Hitman, 43, is returning to the ring to face Marco Antonio Barrera in Manchester on July 2.

The former light-welterweight and welterweight champion is one of Britain’s greatest pound for pound fighters.

And he will face the 48-year-old Mexican in his hometown in an eight-round exhibition bout.

However, back in his heyday, he travelled to Las Vegas to take on the undefeated Mayweather along with a huge army of travelling supporters.

But Money produced a tenth-round stoppage in their 2007 bout that left Hatton devastated and eventually led to him suffering mental health problems.

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Revealing all about his battles with booze and the mind following that setback, he told podcaster James English: “Sometimes I’d go weeks without seeing me mates, weeks without seeing me mates.

“Something in my head, paranoia in the back of my head was saying ‘I hope they don’t think I’m getting too big for my boots, I hope they don’t think I’ve forgotten about them, what might have changed, I hope they don’t think I’ve changed.’

“So I found myself nipping down to see them and, ultimately whereby my first defeat came against Floyd Mayweather, I felt like I’d let everyone down. Something wasn’t quite there, you know.”

Two years later and Hatton returned to Vegas to face Manny Pacquiao in another bumper showdown – only to suffer a second painful loss.

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Hatton continued: “I got the chance to fight Manny Pacquiao again for the pound for pound number one. So obviously when the Pacquiao fight came along that I got destroyed in two rounds in, then my confidence was down. My head was down. Ultimately, I had to retire then.

“If I had taken my own life, because I used to come in here in this very house and sit on that couch and I’d be on my own, do you know what I mean?

“People would say don’t go to the pub and have a drink – I don’t have to go to the pub to have a drink.

“I’d come home from the gym, train me lads, tell a few jokes, crack a few smiles. On the surface, Rick’s alright, then I’d come in here and just cry. Cry all day, cry all day.

“It’s pretty much the same routine every day and then sometimes I’d come in and get a knife out and just sit there with it by my wrist, just crying, cry and cry and cry, and be going ‘come on, come on’.”

Fortunately for Hatton and his fans, the star is in a much better place these days and is a spokesperson for the Tackling Minds mental health organisation.

And Hatton says that his comeback fight was something that he is doing to help his own mental health.

He said previously: “I made a comeback several years ago, and I think my best day as a fighter are behind me.

“But when I got asked to do this exhibition bout, it was a very easy decision to make.

“It’s been a tough time because of Covid, lockdown and mental health and – like a lot of others – I’ve lost family due to mental health in Covid.

“I’m an ambassador for mental health and as a celebration of us coming out of Covid, they said would I like to make one more move about at the Manchester Arena – it was an easy decision for me to make and I said: ‘absolutely’.”

Source: Boxing - thesun.co.uk