It wasn't just Ricky Hatton that took a hammering over the weekend.
A double combo - a new report stating that anti-binge drinking ads could encourage drinking and children's secretary Ed Balls launching a review into the "commercialisation" of childhood - has left the ad industry reeling.
The alcohol report, by the University of Bath, argues that many drink awareness campaigns are "catastrophically misconceived" because some of the drunken instances portrayed - such as being thrown out of a nightclub or passing out at a party - actually play to a youth culture that builds "entertaining drinking stories".
"Extreme inebriation is often seen as a source of personal esteem and social affirmation amongst young people," said Professor Christine Griffin from Bath University.
The study goes as far as to highlight the drink awareness campaign developed by Diageo, which pours millions of pounds into developing responsible drinking ads and owns brands including Guinness, as a failure.
Diageo, not too pleased at the attack, responded: "We're proud of our adverts. They are strategically sound, evidence based and not designed to simply grab headlines." The study will frustrate an embattled drinks industry in the "damned if we do, damned if we don't" vein.
The industry is facing the possibility of a pre-9pm watershed ban on TV ads, from health campaigners and ministers, and has recently had Gordon Brown breathing down its neck.
This comes on top of children's secretary Ed Balls looking at the "commercialisation" of childhood and the role of ads (all of them) as well as the internet.
Details on the nature of the review will be revealed this week, however a battle-weary ad industry is used to assuming the worst.
"There are many issues to discuss and advertisers want to work with government to help find solutions," said advertisers' body ISBA's director of public affairs Ian Twinn, on the defensive again. "But it is vital that ministers do not waste their time and public funds on red herring politics. Restricting advertising will not bring about the desired results and is not the way forward."
With so many governmental reviews and studies - from the likes of Which? and the National Consumer Council - piling on the pressure the question is whether advertising really is to blame?
