Junior Witter: The Rise & the Fall & theā€¦.

Ringsidereport.com Geoff "The Professor" Poundes9th June, 2009

If ever a fighter fought in the shadow of another, then Junior Witter, 37-2, 22 KO's, has conducted his 12 year career hidden behind the long shadow cast by bitter rival Ricky Hatton.

That these two have boxed at the same weight class, running concurrent careers (they both turned pro in 1997) and have never met in the ring is quite remarkable.

Of course, Hatton drew the "Witter" line, refusing to entertain a fight with his loquacious countryman after Junior launched a series of verbal attacks to try and shame Ricky into a contest. Hatton held all the cards - effortlessly popular and universally adored - while Witter struggled to draw crowds to his matches.

None of that had anything to do with their respective abilities in the ring - Witter has long been a first-class operator, schooled in the tradition of the Ingle family that spawned the likes of Herol Graham and Naseem Hamed. It's often forgotten that Witter beat Hatton to a "proper" world title fight by some 5 years, losing a wide decision to Zab Judah for the IBF Light Welterweight Title in just his 17th professional contest. Witter took the contest at late notice, and in keeping with his towering optimism for his own abilities, he gave Judah (at that time at the top of his game) a creditable fight.

Over the following 6 years Witter's career seemed to meander through a series of meaningless contests which merely served to place his progress in a holding pattern, while Ricky defended something called the WBU title a number of times against middling contenders. Of course, it was his oft-recounted win over Kostya Tszyu in 2005 that moved his career into the stratosphere, and the Hitman has been in the truly big time ever since.

Just over a year later, Witter's dominant 12 round decision win over Demarcus Corley to annex the vacant WBC title barely registered outside of Sheffield, Junior's hometown. While Ricky took his legions of fans across the water and boxed on huge HBO pay-per-view fight nights, taking his earnings into the millions, Witter defended his title in relative obscurity at the Doncaster Dome.

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