By William Mackay: 33-year-old Ricky Hatton says he’s not just looking any old fighter to take on for his comeback fight on November 24th at the Manchester Arena, Manchester, Lancashire, United Kingdom. Hatton wants a fighter that is good enough to get him ranked in the top 15 in order to get him a quick title shot against one of them champions. It’s expected that the champion that Hatton is gunning for is the light hitting WBA welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi, as Hatton already knocked him out four years ago in an easy fight.

Hatton said to the Manchester Evening News “It won’t be a journeyman fight. I need a challenge and I have never shied away from a challenge in the whole of my career. I need an opponent to get ranked.”

It’s assumed that Hatton wants someone so he can get ranked high enough to get the Malignaggi title fight. Whether that’s fair to the other contenders or not is open to debate. It probably would be a little off putting if you were a contender and had been waiting for a title shot for a couple of years only to see Hatton make a comeback and get a title shot off one tune-up fight, but that’s boxing for you.

Michael Katsidis had been rumored to be Hatton’s possible opponent for his November 24th fight, but Katsidis says that he’s not been contacted at all about a Hatton fight, although he is up for it if they are thinking about him. It’s possible that Katsidis could still get the fight, but it is more than a little odd that he hasn’t been contacted this close to November 24th.

That would be assuming a lot that Katsidis would be sitting around doing nothing and would drop whatever he’s doing just to take the Hatton fight. He probably would do it, but it’s not likely that he’s the guy that Hatton is looking at if he’s not been contacted this close to the fight. It wouldn’t exactly be fair to Katsidis if he finds out he’s fighting Hatton when they make an announcement this Friday.

The sad part about boxing is that Hatton will likely get a top 15 ranking even if he faced the worst C level opponent he could find. One of the sanctioning bodies would likely see big dollar signs with Hatton and give him at least a bottom 15 ranking. That would be enough for one of the welterweight champions, likely Malignaggi, to offer Hatton a fight in the first quarter of 2013.

Hatton will be careful in whoever he chooses to fight on November 24th because he’s been out of the sport for too long and he may not be able to handle a shot like once did. There’s also the question about his stamina. It was always good during his career, but will be able to still fight hard after having lived such a decadent lifestyle during the past three years? All that weight he put on, and all the drink he consumed. It’s hard to imagine a fighter coming back after having lived like that.