By Edward Chaykovsky
According to Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum, the team behind Amir Khan demanded too much money for a potential fight with eight division world champion Manny Pacquiao.
The two sides were negotiating for weeks, but then Pacquiao announced that he was going to face Timothy Bradley in a trilogy fight on April 9th from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
Khan has since announced that he was moving up in weight, from 147 to 155, to challenge Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez for the WBC middleweight title at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Last year, Pacquiao and members of his team traveled to the UK to meet with Khan and discuss the idea of a potential fight.
The two boxers had trained side by side for a few years and sparred several times, when the two of them were being coached by Freddie Roach. Khan left Roach in 2012 and hired Virgil Hunter. There have been conflicting stories over what transpired in those sparring sessions.
When the options were being evaluated, Arum says the ultimate factor came down to money. Arum says the amount being requested by Khan's team would have made it very hard for his company to make a decent profit from the pay-per-view.
"Essentially it was about money. The Khan people presented their views on what Khan should be paid and what he was worth. But when we looked at the numbers we didn’t think that was attractive as far as us making a profit on the promotion," Arum told Gareth Davies.
