By Sean McDaniel: EBU welterweight champion Matthew Hatton (41-4-1, 16 KO’s) is taking a big risk in traveling to the United States and facing unbeaten knockout puncher Saul Alvarez (35-0-1, 26 KO’s) on March 5th at the Honda Center, in Anaheim, California. Hatton, 29, is the younger, bigger brother of former two division world champion Ricky Hatton. The problem for Matthew is that he has none of the power that his older brother Ricky had while fighting.
Matthew is actually the complete opposite type of fighter as his brother Ricky, preferring to move around the ring, shooting jabs rather than slugging it out on the inside. Hatton is going to be facing one of the hardest punchers in the welterweight division in the form of 20-year-old Alvarez. Forget about Alvarez’s young age; the guy can flat out punch. He’s not unbeatable, though, because he’s got very little defensive ability, has slow hands and looks sluggish when he’s moving around the ring.
If Matthew can box a little, he could give Alvarez a lot of problems in this fight. What he can’t do is just stand and trade with him the way that Hatton has done with some of his European opponents. That won’t work for Hatton and will likely lead to him getting knocked out quickly. That’s not to say that Alvarez can’t be hurt, because we saw Alvarez get staggered by Jose Miguel Cotto, a lightweight, last year. But Hatton can’t afford to test Alvarez’s chin because he hits too hard for Hatton to be trying to experiment with trading with this young kid.
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