“Of course I remember,” Billy Graham says quietly as he pushes back his straw trilby to show me his wounded expression,“I can remember everything,”Graham, who trained Ricky Hatton for all but the last three of his 48 fights, used to sit with his fighter on the grimy steps outside their first boxing gym in Salford in the late 1990s,It was a more innocent time and, rather than being called The Preacher and The Hitman, they were just Billy and Ricky then,They were still years away from the mass adulation and the desperately lonely end.

But, even when reminiscing, The Preacher can’t escape the fact that, this weekend, it will be exactly three months since his lost friend is thought to have taken his own life at the age of 46.On 14 September, Hatton’s body was found at home, in Hyde, six miles from where we sit now in Mossley, on the outskirts of Manchester.For weeks there was an outpouring of grief and love for Hatton in Manchester and boxing.The pain continues, privately, among the fighter’s family and friends.But a national story brought a sobering acceptance that such glory and fervour will not return soon to boxing in this country.

It is hard to imagine a fighter today being able to conjure up the magic which Hatton once created,Tens of thousands of fans, most of whom considered themselves personal friends of The Hitman, followed the wise-cracking, ferocious urchin-faced boxer from Manchester to Las Vegas with roaring joy,Before then, in mid-December 1999, two years into his pro career, Hatton’s record was a pristine 16‑0,But, rather than thinking about endorsement deals or pay-per-view sales, the boxer and his trainer had history in mind,“We sat on the steps all the time,” Graham says.

“All the other fighters had gone and we’d talk about what we were going to do.I told him how good he was and that he’d definitely get in the Hall of Fame.”Last year, 15 months before his death, Hatton was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in Canastota, upstate New York.It completed a 25-year odyssey to reach the pantheon.“You can’t get better than that,” Graham says.

“There’ve been loads of great fighters who can’t make the Hall of Fame.You can be a ‘world’ champion or even the undisputed but the Hall of Fame is the ultimate, innit?”The Preacher covers his eyes as tears slip through his fingers.“Can you get me some tissues?” he mumbles.“I’m not a soft fucker.When I get angry, I don’t cry.

But I am now …”In 2010 Graham took legal action against Hatton and his father, Ray, in a dispute over money owed to the trainer,The Hattons settled out of court,Ricky and his parents, meanwhile, became bitterly estranged and did not speak to each other for years,Graham still feels bereft,But he wipes his eyes after I mention a specific bout, in June 2000, when Hatton fought Gilbert Quiros in Detroit.

Against Quiros, who was nicknamed The Animal, Hatton was tested like never before.“That fight was the most important fight of Ricky’s life,” Graham says.“Ricky handled nerves better than any fighter I ever had.But he was agitated because he’d found out his girlfriend was pregnant [with his now 24-year-old son Campbell] and he was cutting weight.We went down to the Kronk [the famous Detroit gym] as I wanted to see Quiros.

He looked so dangerous on the bag, like Thomas Hearns,Tall, skinny and every shot he landed was really hard,“Nobody else wore body belts [the protector which Graham used to absorb Hatton’s blows in training] then,I was also wearing ridiculous shorts because I’d forgotten to wash my kit,So everyone was laughing at us.

We were the only white guys – and Ricky was the whitest kid they’d ever seen.I didn’t want to exhaust Ricky but I said: ‘I want one fantastic round where you show everything and back me up against the ropes.’ They were taking the piss out of us but then, when Ricky started throwing punches, they were whooping: ‘Wow! Whoa!’ They all fell in love with him.”Graham shudders.“The fight was horrendous.

Quiros was scary, landing jabs, uppercuts, body shots.But Ricky never panicked, even after a huge cut above his eye.He came back to the corner after the first round and went: ‘I’ve got double vision and he winded me.’ I said: ‘You’ve got to back him up because this is drastic.’”Hatton tore into Quiros and stopped him with a deadly body shot after a blistering series of combinations.

Graham says: “The natural reaction of any young fighter when cut like that is to back off.It’s not normal to walk straight into the tornado.That’s when I really knew how special Ricky was because he came through a terrible situation.The last doubts were gone.”Five years later, in June 2005, Hatton reached the summit of his career when he faced the formidable Kostya Tszyu at the MEN Arena in Manchester.

Hatton had won all 38 of his previous contests but the IBF junior-welterweight title showdown between two driven men was framed by a darkness,“A lot of people didn’t want that fight because Tszyu was so dangerous,” Graham recalls,“But Ricky was mad for it because he wanted the glory,That was our dream – to be the best in the world,We knew how good Tszyu was and that his style was really dodgy for Ricky.

I was confident but I knew Tszyu could knock him out.I went to his house the day before and said: ‘Listen Ricky, you’re going to try to break each other, and it’s going to be really hard.’”When Graham was picked up by a car the following night, he was “absolutely shitting myself.But by the time I got to the dressing room I was completely different.As I walked in, Ricky was shadow boxing in front of the mirror.

I started shadow boxing in front of him,Ricky held his nerve like Clint Eastwood in a gunfight,”Graham adds: “When I was a boxer people used to ask: ‘Are you looking forward to the fight?’ I’d go: ‘No, I’m looking forward to getting it over with,’ When it’s over you think: ‘That was fucking fantastic!’ But it’s horrible until then,”The intensity, he confirms, was “unbelievable.

We all have dreams but it’s very rare they come true.Ours did that night.”Tszyu was rescued by his corner before the last round.“I turned around and saw what had happened,” Graham says.“I told Ricky: ‘It’s over.

It’s over.’ Oh, the relief on his face.I went: ‘You fucking did it.’ And Ricky said: ‘No, we did it.’”Graham cries silently, his chest heaving.

I try to comfort him, telling him that tears are understandable,“No, they’re not,” the 70-year-old says gruffly,“I’m sick of crying,”The Preacher believes “the lunatics took over the asylum” after their momentous victory,Money and fame rolled in and Hatton, needing to feel loved, revelled in the adoration.

But he also drank too much and, as his searing focus diluted, the demons gnawed at him.Hatton had eight more fights in four years but they included two cataclysmic knockout defeats by Floyd Mayweather Jr and Manny Pacquiao.He slipped into a deep depression, fuelled by alcohol.In 2012, Hatton told me: “It got to a point where I didn’t care if I lived or died.I’d been this working-class hero, this down-to-earth Manchester lad, who people liked so much that 25,000 of them flew to Vegas to watch me fight, singing: ‘There’s only one Ricky Hatton …’ They ended up with another Ricky Hatton altogether – a drunk, crying in the corner of a pub.

They used to say: ‘What a fighter! What a cracking lad!’ and then they saw this weeping wreck,”Hatton’s comeback that same year ended in another stoppage defeat to Vyacheslav Senchenko, an unheralded Ukrainian,The next dozen years were difficult but his greatest achievements in the ring meant the Hall of Fame came calling in 2024,Jane Couch, who had defeated the British Boxing of Control in court in 1998 when they refused to grant a professional licence to her or any female fighter, became a hall of famer that same summer,She was a courageous pioneer who suffered enormously from cruel prejudice.

Hatton was one of her staunchest supporters and they shared their personal struggles.It was a beautiful ending in boxing for both of them when they travelled to Canastota to be honoured.Couch says: “When I got the call from the Hall of Fame I was in shock.I sent Rick a message: ‘We made it.’ Ricky rang me and he went: ‘I can’t fucking believe it.

’ We met at Manchester airport and had a Guinness before we got on the plane to New York.We then had to get a car to Canastota and we had a natter for the next seven hours – but I’m good at reading people and I knew he wasn’t right.“A few days later we went for a wander round the grounds of Canastota and he told me the story of him and Billy sitting on the steps of the gym and dreaming of being in the Hall of Fame.I knew they hadn’t spoken much for years but I said: ‘Should I ring Billy now?’ Ricky was like: ‘Er … yeah.Go on.

’ I tried but we couldn’t get hold of Billy.“I could tell Ricky was agitated and not well.When he had to go on stage in Canastota he turned it into a comedy show because he liked to make everybody laugh.”A few weeks later Hatton said he had spoken to his old trainer.“That never happened,” Graham tells Couch and me.

“Ricky was struggling,” the 57-year-old Couch reminds him,“Of course,” Graham stresses,“I should have been the bigger man,But I couldn’t understand how he was fearless in the ring but would let people manipulate him outside,He couldn’t stand up for himself.

”Hatton tried previously to speak to him and Graham looks mortified.Even when we urge him to think of all he did for Hatton over the years, rather than torturing himself for not calling the fighter in the last few months, he is adamant: “There’s no way I can stop feeling guilty.”The day after Hatton died, Graham left a bunch of flowers outside the fighter’s house, with a simple note: “Sorry I wasn’t there for you.Love Billy (The Preacher) x.”Earlier that devastating Sunday, Matthew Hatton, Ricky’s brother, was at home when the police arrived