BY TIM PARSONS
Amir Khan’s crushing defeat to Connello Alvarez was predictable because Alvarez is such an aggressive and powerful puncher.
Khan was always going to need a miracle to win against Alvarez. However, we must credit can for his bravery and ambition in taking on this fight.
He put on a good performance up until he got caught with the big right that dumped him on the canvas. One judge had Khan as winning the fight on points, until the big punched that decked him and laid bare on the canvas.
However, Khan now admits he stepped too far by going up in weight. He told Sky Sports ”I just stepped too far. Everything was going fine until that one big shot. When a guy is a lot bigger and a lot stronger that’s what’s going to happen. But I don’t think this put me down in any way.Everything was going my way. I was winning the fight”
”Was winning”, and ‘did win’ are two different things, and perhaps Amir Khan should have foreseen the high likelihood of defeat before he even took up the fight. In saying that, he still deserves credit for challenging himself this much that he would dare dream he would beat Alvarez. Victory for Amir Khan was in no way and impossibility, but a scenario that was less likely than likely when the facts of both fighters are considered and evaluated. REal fighters are expected to take on big fights were the risk of defeat is very real, and the rewards for victory even greater than the risks.
There is no way Khan could have thought this to be a fight where victory was anything near secure. He knew he will have to fight a special fight to win; one that would rank him among the greats of British boxing. It was a chance worth taking, but not one in which he can justified for stating in hindsight that he stepped too far. The Bolton fighter was under no delusions at the time he signed for this clash that he was taking on an enormous task that will call on more than his very best in terms of the delivery of focus, skill, attack, and resistance. Khan, like David Haye, has always been a bit of a daring fighter, whose confidence and ambitions have always been sky high.
Khan remains in the mandatory position for the WBC belt held by Danny Garcia, who knocked out Khan in the 4th round a few years ago. ”I’m still in the mandatory position with the WBC, he said, that’s a big fight for me”. It is indeed, but it is another very dangerous fight which can end up with another devastating loss. ”There are big fights for me in America, even Miguel Cotto- bringing him to the UK , or Manny Pacquiao. I’d like to fight in the UK next.
A fight against either Cotto, Garcia or Pacquiao, are all very dangerous fights for Khan, but fights that can restore some pride for him if he wins. Khan is one of Britain’s talented fighters, but he is not a legend, a title only given to rarely accomplished fighters. Amir Khan’s crushing defeat to Alvarez was predictable, but even in defeat, he can hold his head up high.
