There is little I know of Kevin Kelley, except that he is a boxer who has plied his trade with some dignity over two decades and 50 professional fights. It just seems to me that his sport would have benefited enormously had he managed, as seemed distinctly possible last Friday, to put a cork in the bottle of 'Prince' Naseem Hamed.

For the Naz phenomenon is as phoney as it is nasty and sullies the the spirit of true sportsmanship.

Hamed is a bright little lad from Sheffield and a talented, but far from invincible, featherweight fighter. What makes him different from most is that he has the ego of a heavyweight.

He does not only need to beat opponents, he has to taunt them. Kelley, he told us endlessly before a glove had been laced, ''would have his spark knocked out.'' In the event it was Hamed who almost ran short of a shilling for the meter, but he got off the floor to save his and many other people's investment.

For that is really what Hamed is all about; he is a money-making machine for himself and his backers, notably his manager, Frank Warren. When Hamed was dumped on the canvas three times during his 'triumph' in New York, Warren was the one in most pain.

He has apparently negotiated a deal worth $12m with a cable company. Defeats are not part of the agreement. Nor can his protege afford to behave like a civilised human being.

So Hamed will go on threatening to dispose of challengers in the most outlandish fashion. He will strut, pout, somersault into the ring in his leopardskin shorts and all the while, or at least until he gets caught with a good jab, the money meter will keep ticking.

There are two points often made in his defence. Does he not simply indulge in harmless hype? And did the great Muhammad Ali not take part in the same nonsense? The answers are 'no' and 'no.'

I don't particularly like boxing, but I have always admired boxers, who are usually the most honest of sportsmen. They do not fake injury and they normally have great respect for their opponents.

To believe that all is fair in the battle to sell tickets is to cheapen and demean the sport and its participants. I don't mind Hamed calling himself a Prince - after all, John 'Cowboy' McCormack did not own a ranch - but I object most strenuously to him treating everybody else as serfs.

Secondly, the comparisons with Ali are absurd. Thomas Hauser, Ali's biographer, was asked about similarities.

''The Prince is a Muslim and talks a lot,'' he opined. ''That's it, that's all they have in common.

''Ali said he was the 'Greatest' and he was. He was possibly the best-looking man in the world.

Nobody except the Prince's mother would suggest he is in the same category.''

Those who know the world of boxing intimately tell me there are featherweights who can punch a lot harder than Kevin Kelley. That is good news.

Sport has a way of handing out doses of humility at the most unexpected moments. That is something 'Prince' Naseem Hamed has yet to learn . . . and he will.

q It must be the spirit of Christmas that is making me good-humoured this week. What I would like from Santa, in addition to the de-throning of the 'Prince,' is the debunking of Arsenal's Ian Wright, a player who typifies everything that is rotten about professional football.

There are those who see Wright's on and off the field antics as the actions of a cheeky chappie. In reality, he is a foul-mouthed creep who is prepared to put fellow professionals in trouble to further his own career.

His latest escapade, screaming abuse at his own club's fans, has led to him being interviewed by the police. Can we hope that the FA, a body with all the moral fibre of yesterday's chewing gum, will at last be able to impose some sanctions?

In a television commercial Wright insists he would have loved a meeting with Martin Luther King. The latter might have preferred a chat with the Little Rock Police.

q We were on our way to the Parc des Princes stadium in Paris, travelling in company with some SRU officials and their wives. Two gendarmes proceeded our coach, clearing a path through the traffic.

As we roared up a one-way street the wrong way, the man in seat next to me observed: ''If they had got their army to the Front this quickly, the course of history might have been changed.''

It was Jimmy Ross, president of the union in 1979-80, renowned referee and the proudest former pupil of George Heriot's that ever walked round Goldenacre

Jimmy was a journalist's delight, a man with an opinion on everything. Some of his best stories were told against himself.

On Monday, Jimmy Ross died. The rugby community has lost a great servant.