Former champion Hatton now seeking a Chinese star

Former world champion Ricky Hatton says he hopes to find his successor in Asia, with the popular Briton homing in on the region in the hope of unearthing the next big thing in boxing.

A former world light-welterweight and welterweight champion, the 34-year-old Hatton was knocked out on his return to the ring last month, and insists he will not be coming out of retirement again.

It was time to move on, he said in Hong Kong, where he staged a night of boxing last Tuesday under the Asia-Pacific arm of Hatton Promotions, which has set up an office in the southern Chinese city.

"This is such a successful, big part of the world and nobody here does boxing, so that's the whole purpose of us coming here," the likable Hatton said.

"The law of averages says there must be some talent out here somewhere and I'd like to raise the profile of boxing out here.

"Boxing is a massive passion for me and there's nothing I'd like better than to be the first promoter to bring a world champion through to this part of the world, to give people someone to be proud of, like the fans were of me."

Hatton insisted he had laid his demons to rest despite losing to Vyacheslav Senchenko in November, and hopes to get some measure of the satisfaction he got in the ring from finding new talent.