b'ROUND 11My Ricky is going to knock your block off!View from suite 1732. Undaunted, well-fuelled and proud as ever of her boy, Carol approached Castillo, smiled and attempted to broker a conversation. Given the language barrier, she For us hacks, one of the more pleasant traditions in covering a British fighter abroad hasexplained herself in a combination of pidgin English and sign language. I, she said, been the morning-after debrief. Actually, this tends to be more like an afternoon-afterpointing to herself, am Ricky Hattons mum. Castillo then nodded politely and Carol because whether you are Lennox Lewis or Ricky Hatton, your fight is still going to havecontinued. My Ricky is going to knock your fucking block off!had a considerable post-fight party appended to it. Lennox used to turn up to meet usThe next morning, no one was quite sure whether the message had gone entirely at pretty much whatever time he felt alive enough to do so, a large pair of sunglassesover Castillos head. What we know for certain is that he didnt answer back.wrapped across his face to hide the damage beneath. Hatton is not so vain and not shyHer elder son was particularly tickled by the tale. What he was not so pleased about to let the bruises on his features tell their own story. He also did us a favour by pitchingwas the scent that he sniffed of the negative tone that would colour the coverage of his up almost at the appointed hour. fight in the papers back home.Thus, just after midday, a small number of us filtered into the Hattons CaesarsI keep hearing people say my career has stood still since the Kostya Tszyu fight in suite. Once the fight is over, the bubbles in the pre-fight tension have all flattened, any2005, he said. Stood still? What a load of bollocks that is. What more can I do than formality has dissipated, the atmosphere is generally matier and thus did Ricky tell usunify the light welterweight titles, move up a weight, win a world title, fight a world about how Matthew woke him in the morning by coming into his room and strikingchampion in my first fight as a welterweight and then move back and beat another poses completely naked except for his new IBF International Welterweight belt that heworld champion? If that is a career standing still its baffling. It is not always easy to had won the night before and now had strapped round his midriff. shine against these people, they are the best.The other significant piece of news from the night before was the performanceAnd indeed, he has a point and, to a large extent, we nodded dutifully. You could of Carol, Rickys mother, in the early hours of the morning. She and Ray had left thesay that we were just giving him the opportunity to mount his own defence. But post-fight party in the Paris hotel and gone to queue for a cab back to Caesars. In thenevertheless, this, I guess, is one of the hypocrisies of being a sportswriter. Is it dishonest cab-rank, they found themselves standing next to Jos Luis Castillo, the highly fanciedto nod dutifully the morning after the fight, when you dont really agree with the Mexican boxer, who had also won that night and was now billed to return to Vegas toguy, but when he has just done 12 heavy rounds and come out on top, when youve fight Hatton in June. Castillos performance that night had been disappointing, but thatspent the best part ofa month really warming to a personality whose openness and could not detract from the fact that he has a mighty fight record and a status that waswelcoming nature is so rare in modern professional sport and he is sitting there, friendly up there with Hattons greatest opponent to date, Kostya Tszyu. Hatton-Castillo was aas you like, happily signing autographs for us even though he knows what weve got in fight about which promoters and TV executives were going to get really very excited.store for him in the papers the following day? OwenSuite 1732, Caesars Palace, 1.58pm, Sunday 21st January, still joking, still championpage 59'