By Joey Mills – “Magic” Matthew Hatton was denied his chance to step out from the shadow of his famous sibling Ricky, after contesting a hard-fought draw with Lovemore N’Dou over the IBO “World” Welterweight championship.
Matthew, the younger brother of the two-weight world champion Ricky “Hitman” Hatton, has no reason to be aggrieved however as the contest was never less than close, and I personally scored the contest a draw in accordance with American judge Tom Miller..
Champion N’Dou earned the first round with jabs to the head and body, while threatening to uncork his counter right. The early going was scrappy with Hatton taking the next two rounds, his South African opponent throwing wildly and finding the Manchester fighters defence impenetrable.
The ensuing three rounds could have been where Hatton lost his grip on the fringe world title belt, his work-rate dropped and he seemed unable to work out N’dou’s cagey defensive style. The “nickname” went to the body well and clinched to conserve energy and prolong his dominance of the fight. The 38 year old used the guile and experience of “amount” of fights to outwork Hatton. His finest moment of this moment was a tough right hand in the sixth round that moved Matthew’s head to the side.
Hatton came out of the blocks for the seventh more active, as he tried to establish a rhythm with his jab. Lovemore’s punch output dropped and Hatton unleashed a two-fisted body assault at least somewhat evocative of his decorated brother at the bell. He carried this determination into the next round, which he began by deftly avoiding N’Dou’s early work. Hatton’s strategy in this stanza was to pop out quick shots and keep out of the way of his opponent’s limited riposte.
The ninth was perhaps another missed opportunity for Hatton, eschewing what made his last two sessions so successful, the challenger simply moved forward with little aggression He was caught with a flurry of hard shots in the best flurry of the night from N’Dou, and a decent one-two combination at the death of the round was not enough to erase the damage.
The tenth was sloppy and uninteresting, Hatton nicking with a few short rights. In this round, as in many of the others, N’Dou appeared to take a rest, a necessary evil with his advancing years. The competitors split the final two rounds, appropriate for a fight in which the advantage had swung both ways throughout.
“Magic” pressed forward intelligently in round eleven, landing slick combo’s and not getting bogged down in N’Dou’s smothering tactics. Landing a crisp right hand in the last ten seconds of the period, the round looked to be the perfect jumping-off point for a final-round assault.
It was not to be, as Lovemore N’Dou began the round with a crunching right hand, and didn’t let up for the first two minutes of the session. Hatton was made to hold on, and shipped some quality right hands from the experienced champion. The veteran faded in the last minute and Hatton landed another good right to end the round.
Matthew Hatton was visibly disgusted by the decision, but his reluctance cost him the fight. Lovemore N’Dou looked for breathers throughout the fight, but Hatton did not take advantage of this enough. Whether it was a matter of poor strategy, or lack of fitness with this being only his third championship distance fight (to N’Dou’s eleven), the challenger simply did not press enough. In the end, the draw was a fair result but sadly for Hatton, the action was not engaging enough to really warrant a rematch.