If Manny has Jinkee, Ricky has Jenny

IBO lightwelterweight champion Ricky Hatton, who stakes his crown against Manny Pacquiao in Las Vegas on May 2, is keeping in step with Pacman in their battle of one-upmanship outside the ring.

When the Hitman met Pacman on a promotional tour in Manchester recently, they were matched in a game of darts. Pacquiao likes to throw darts with friends in his Los Angeles apartment but isn’t a serious tournament player.

Pacquiao obliged Hatton in a game at the New Inn, a Manchester watering hole where darts is played obsessively. For the record, Hatton and his father Ray (a former soccer player with Manchester City) are decorated partners in darts. Some years back, they won the Hyde and District Thursday League and the Barrie Hett Champion of Champions tournament in which teams from all over Greater Manchester competed.

So when Hatton challenged Pacquiao to a game in the pub, he had just one thing in mind. He wanted to go one up on Pacman. Sure enough, Hatton outplayed Pacquiao in his homecourt.

“I think Manny’s got the bit between his teeth because I beat him at darts,” said Hatton, quoted by Claude Abrams in London’s Boxing News.

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Taking their battle of one-upmanship to another level, Hatton recently announced his engagement to long-time girlfriend Jennifer Dooley. Pacquiao’s love story with wife Jinkee is well-known and much-publicized. Obviously, Hatton isn’t inclined to be overshadowed in the romance department.

Hatton and Dooley have lived together for four years but the Hitman popped the question only last Valentine’s Day during a Caribbean cruise.

Hatton met Dooley when they were five years old at Mottram Primary School in Hyde on the outskirts of Manchester. They didn’t reconnect until over 20 years later.

“We didn’t keep in touch but I was good friends with Jenna, the girlfriend of Ricky’s brother Matthew (and) I was out with Jenna when I met Ricky,” related Dooley to Brian Doogan in The Ring Magazine (Fall 2008).

According to Doogan, Dooley has a ritual with Hatton when she leaves his dressing room to take her seat at ringside before every fight. She would say, “See you after for a drink” then kisses Hatton and whispers, “I love you.” Dooley said the act of endearment is “a very emotional moment.”

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Hatton said Dooley’s influence has mellowed his notoriously wild lifestyle.

“When Jennifer moved in, she asked me how long I’d been in my house,” continued Hatton. “I told her, it must be 18 months and she couldn’t believe it. The instructions on how to work the cooker were still inside the flamin’ oven. When I lived on my own, it was takeaways seven nights a week and there’s a big difference between takeaways seven nights a week and a little bit of home cooking. That difference between my girlfriend cooking a meal and me phoning up for spare ribs and salt and pepper ribs seven nights a week is eight or nine pounds, I would say.”

Dooley gave up her job as a college lecturer at Manchester College of Art and Technology when her request for a leave to attend Hatton’s fight against Floyd Mayweather in December 2007 was denied by school officials. She clearly felt it was more important to do her dressing room routine with Hatton than stay employed as a college lecturer.

Dooley confessed that she wasn’t a big boxing fan at the start. “I used to hate boxing,” she said. But that mindset has changed because of the Hitman.

Although Dooley is to Hatton as Jinkee is to Pacquiao, it is a seven-year-old boy who is the light of the British Bulldog’s life. Hatton has a son Campbell from a previous relationship.

Hatton said he has plans for his son outside of boxing.

“I’d prefer him not to box,” he said. “I think any parent would be a liar if they said they wanted their son to box.” Hatton has dreams of Campbell becoming a pop singer. In his Nokia phone, Hatton has a loop of Campbell singing the Oasis song “Rock ‘N’ Roll Star.”