There has been some bruising sparring going on behind the scenes as Ricky Hatton and Manny Pacquiao’s handlers and legal teams have battled it out over which fighter holds the financial face cards in what is likely to be the most talked-about, biggest grossing superfight in 2009. Right now it appears destined to happen. We’ll see early next week.
Yet behind the scenes, I understand that a series of power struggles have gone in the battle over financial control. After Hatton’s team pulled the plug yesyerday, Pacquiao’s handlers were frantically attempting to draw Floyd Mayweather Jr out of retirement, a move which proved unsuccessful.
Did Pacquiao’s advisers in the Philippines underestimate Hatton’s PPV pulling power in the UK, most likely even greater with fewe fans travelling to Las Vegas because of the fiscal depression ?
Was there a bitter after taste for Pacquiao’s team, dealing with Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer, Hatton’s promotional agent in the States, after he had negotiated a 68-32 deal in favour of Oscar De La Hoya in his December fight with Pacquiao ?
I might venture to suggest, given the mesmerising performance by Pacquiao in that fight, his handlers felt they had something better coming this time around. After all, it was Shaefer they were dealing with.
Nonetheless, Hatton’s legal counsel, Gareth Williams, and Pacquiao’s adviser in The Philipinnes, Franklin Gacal, were in contact by phone conference in the early hours of Friday morning. The two deal breakers laid out their positions.
Gacal, I understand, still staked a claim to a 60-40 split. Williams told me he had ruled that out to his counterpart.
“I told Gacal that we already had an agreement for 50-50 and we are not going to budge from that,” Williams told The Daily Telegraph. “Ricky has a castiron right to that share, because he has a great draw through pay-per-view in the UK, and a huge fan base. My insistence to Pacquiao’s handlers was that we have already drawn a line in the sand.”
Williams said: “Manny Pacquiao is a phenomenal fighter and what he has achieved is fantastic. It is the one fight Ricky really wants, but we are not being held to ransom, because there are great opponents queuing up to fight him.”
“At the beginning of our negotiations we wanted Manny to fight here, but we had been told by HBO he was not a big enough pay per view draw outside the US to hold it here.”
“All through the negotiations we have gone along with demands from other people. We refuse to have a gun held to our head.”
It looks from this observer’s viewpoint that there were too many middle men in this deal, and thus, too many chinese whispers. We are yet to hear – properly – in the public eye, statements from the two fighters. Funny that, isn’t it.
