Pacquiao and Hatton set to enter ring

The MGM Grand Garden Arena has hosted every big-name musical artist from Britney Spears to Tom Jones.

Tonight, it is the fans of Ricky Hatton that are providing the songs inside the sold-out venue.

The British contingent just loves to sing. What's really amazing is that they all know all the words to the silly Hatton-themed song. It's as if the lyrics are ingrained into each of them as a rite of passage. The British love Oasis, The Beatles and the Ricky Hatton song. Okay, I guess it's not really that amazing. I even have the entire song memorized at this point and I am unfortunately likely to be singing nonstop for the next month.

It's bad enough the songs were echoing throughout the undercard, but there was a makeshift choir in the lobby of the MGM Grand at least as early as 4:30 this afternoon. They had probably been there singing since Wednesday.

All of the fans that have made the long journey from the United Kingdom just hope they will still be singing when the night is over.

Then again, the MGM doesn't expect to run out of alcohol as they famously did after a previous Hatton fight, so it's quite possible they will be singing regardless of the outcome.

The legions of Manny Pacquiao fans in attendance have been much more subdued throughout the evening, erupting in applause only when the fighter was shown on the video screens working out in the locker room.

Though there are a total of 11 fights on the card tonight, the crowd didn't really start filling in until about the eighth or ninth fight of the evening.

Those that were here got to see a great performance by Matt Korobov. The young Russian improved to 5-0 with an absolutely dominanting victory over Anthony Bartenelli. How lopsided was the bout? Korobov landed 65 punches, while Bartenelli was able to throw just 47. Of those attempts, only three landed. In the second round, during which the referee mercifully called an end to the carnage, Korobov outlanded Bartenelli, 38-1. The fight was the second of five televised bouts.

After that, Daniel Jacobs earned a unanimous decision over Michael Walker in a fairly uneventful bout. In the final fight before the main event, Humberto Soto stopped Benoit Gaudet in the ninth round.

The action is getting ready to start. Hatton entered to a mellow song that actually seemed to take a bit of the wind out of the sails of his supporters. They will get it back in no time to be sure. Hatton is already having a pretty good day. His brother Matthew won a fight on the undercard and his beloved football club, Manchester City, earned a victory early in the day.

Pacquiao has now entered as well. The crowd appears to be very evenly split at this point.

Okay, here we go!

Tonight, the Review-Journal will be providing round-by-round coverage of the main event. In addition, we will provide round-by-round scores from myself (Adam Hill), RJ boxing writer Steve Carp and RJ sports columnist Ed Graney. All rounds are scored 10-9 unless otherwise noted.