LOVEMORE NDOU vs MATTHEW HATTON

Attitude is important in boxing, not in the new interpretation of the word (as in “has attitude”, which apparently means to be provocative and challenging in manner) but in the context of attitude of mind.

If a fighter goes into a bout with the wrong attitude, he can lose. The underrated lightweight champion of the 1950s, Jimmy Carter, didn’t always have the right attitude. He twice lost the title in winnable fights, then regained it from the boxers who had beaten him. He was notoriously unreliable in non-title fights. Joe “Old Bones” Brown, who also held the lightweight title, admitted: “I didn’t have the right mental attitude,” after being held to a draw by the capable but run-of-the-mill Joey Lopes in a non-title bout in 1957. “I thought I’d go along with him for four or five rounds and then put him away — but when I went to finish him off, I couldn’t do it.”

I’m wondering if attitude will play a part in Friday’s IBO welterweight title fight between Lovemore Ndou and Matthew Hatton in England.

Ndou has been extremely disparaging in his comments about Hatton, calling him a donkey that thinks it’s a racehorse because Hatton has trained for so long in the same gym as big brother Ricky. Ndou seems to believe that he will not simply beat Matthew but embarrass him, thus prodding Ricky into a “revenge of the brother” fight that would be a big payday for the Australian-domiciled South African veteran. As Ndou sees it, he is simply on a different level to Matthew Hatton.

“He’s been hanging around his brother and all of a sudden he thinks he’s this great fighter,” Ndou told this week’s press conference, “and I intend to expose him.”

Is Ndou overconfident, I wonder — does he have the wrong attitude concerning this fight?

Hatton is the clear underdog, but he seems to have the right attitude. He has trained hard for the past 10 weeks, he says, and he feels that he is a new fighter since hooking up with trainer Lee Beard 18 months ago. The Hatton team brought in the highly competent Baltimore fighter Tim Coleman to be Matthew's main sparring partner. Hatton says that people will be amazed at how comfortably he controls the fight on Friday.

On form and level of opposition, Ndou should win. He has fought a string of world champions and contenders in a 16-year career that began when he was a junior lightweight, and in 59 fights he has never been stopped. Although Ndou is 38, he is a superfit type who never lets himself get overweight or out of shape, and he has been the 12-round distance 10 times. Dropped twice in the early rounds by Junior Witter, he was chasing the British boxer around the ring in the later stages of their fight in Los Angeles; heavy hitters such as Miguel Cotto and Kermit Cintron were unable to put a dent in Ndou.

Hatton hasn’t boxed at anywhere near this level of opposition, and it is probably fair to say that he is generally held in low regard by the British boxing fraternity. He admits he has had a “slow burning” career, but at the age of 28 he believes that now is his time to shine.

The southpaw Craig Watson easily outboxed Hatton in May 2008, a result that was considered a sharp upset. Since then, though, Hatton has changed trainers and won four bouts in a row. This includes workmanlike wins over veterans Ben Tackie and Ted Bami.

Ndou won a unanimous decision over former world title challenger Philip Ndou (no relation) in his last fight, making his typical strong finish — one judge gave Lovemore the last five rounds. He did suffer a cut over the right eye, however, in sparring in Australia last month. There were concerns that the fight with Hatton might have to be postponed, but Ndou says that he received medical clearance and that the cut has healed so well that it is now invisible (“It’s a blessing to be black,” he joked at the press conference).

One would think, though, that the cut at the very least caused a serious disruption to Ndou’s sparring — and as we all know, sparring is an important part of a boxer’s preparation.

My impression is that Ndou feels he is so far above Hatton in terms of talent and experience that he can go ahead and meet him under less-than-ideal conditions.

Maybe Ndou is right, at that. He is a durable pressure fighter who can outwork, outlast and sometimes overwhelm opponents who are below world-championship class. The win over Philip Ndou was an impressive one — but Philip had boxed only once in the past five years. Hatton hasn’t boxed for six months but I understand he has been in steady training, a projected Las Vegas bout against Zab Judah having fallen through. The fact that Ricky Hatton, in his role as promoter, was willing to put his brother in with Judah suggests to me that the Hatton camp really does believe that Matthew is ready to make a big breakthrough.

My first thoughts were that Ndou will be much too good and too seasoned for Hatton, but, as sometimes happens, as the bout gets nearer, and on deeper inspection, I have been shifting to the other side.

Perhaps it will indeed all come down to attitude. Hatton is clearly feeling good about himself, and he sees this as the fight of his life, whereas Ndou has seen it all before and, although in rock-solid physical condition, just might be a little too complacent in his mental approach. As unlikely as it might seem, I’m going for a Hatton upset win — he cannot possibly stop the tough-as-nails Ndou, but, on home ground and given all the circumstances, I believe he can outpoint him.