Quote Originally Posted by Ricardo "Finito" Lopez

Hit him on the arms and shoulders, use head movement, go to the body more, use angles on the inside.
Ricky is very lucky that the "fair but firm" Joe Cortez broke them up so often on the inside because Floyd would have chopped him up bad. Trying to bull him on the inside would have gotten Hatton killed. Floyd covers his entire body with his left arm and puts his left shoulder on your chest, unless, he has his elbow to your neck; either way you are not landing that right hand and that elbow on your neck is preventing your body from being able turn and find leverage. Your left hook is landing on glove and arm. There's nothing to hit over there. In between these punches youre missing all over the place you're being countered with a right uppercut to your face.

With a fighter like Floyd who is so tight defensively just trying to bang on him will not work. How could something like that work against something that is so based on exploiting that very thing? Floyd wants you to do that.

Fighters with tight defense hate one thing. Thats being forced open. And the act of punching leaves you open. Traditionally the goal of the swarmer has always been to bring the fight to their opponents forcing them to punch, and therefore, making them open as they are in the act of punching. The swarmer is giving you many punches to counter but the twist is try and counter and you might get hit. An interesting dilemma in boxing that many don't give enough thought to.

I think Floyd must understand this on some level as he very rarely will counterpunch. His style is centered around rendering his opponent's assault useless and hitting them with leads that are very hard to counter as he barely commits to them (his lead left hook and lead right hand). "Potshotting" the Mayweathers like to call it.Thats an extremely hard fighter to fight. When you lead you miss and he won't counter your punches meaning you can't punch him then either. So many opponents are forced into doing just what you outlined. That is, trying to just get inside and bull him. And thats when they get cut up and busted down.

The one counter that floyd does throw on the inside with some regularity - the counter right uppercut after he rolls your right hand off of his shoulder; a roll counter - leaves him exposed to a left hook though. Notice how his head is completely open and exposed during the window which he throws it. He was looking for the left hook in response to Hatton's lead left hook also. Something he had obviously been working on in training for him. The "check hook" like Steward says. Its funny cause I could have sworn the check hook only applied to right hands or at least thats always been my thinking. I call that counter left hook in response to a left hook something else.

Well anyway, Its something Floyd was trying to establish all through this fight. Something which Hatton could've have exploited but didn't. Trigger his counter "check hook" with your left hook and as he opens to throw his left hook in response to you hit him with a right hand. He circles away to his left as he throws his punch which is common to the check hook so its unlikely the right hand could reach his head. I would try to get his kidney underneath the arm. He would stop trying that counter on me after a few of those.