By Edward Chaykovsky
British star Amir Khan (30-3, 19KOs) admits that his back was against the wall when he selected former WBO 140-pound champion Chris Algieri (20-1, 8KOs) as his opponent of choice for this coming Friday night at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
One of Khan's first selections was Adrien Broner. Khan says Broner refused to back away from his demand for a catch-weight, which is likely true considering Broner is making Shawn Porter fight him at 144-pounds on June 20th.
Other possible opponents like Miguel Cotto were not possible due to conflicts with dates and television networks.
Algieri, a network free agent with no return date set, was an easy fight to get done in a pinch.
"There were a few names I wanted to fight," said Khan to Nick Parkinson. "Broner was another name, which I got no response back. Another one, Miguel Cotto, would have been a great fight for me. Boxing has a lot of different promotion teams, there are a lot of TV networks that work separately and it's really hard to get a fight that you want.
"I think Algieri was in a position where he needed to make the fight, I was in a position where I was leaving it too late waiting for other fighters to get back to me and they weren't getting back to me."
"I thought before I make the mistake where I wait so long and I don't get the fight that I want, and I don't get to fight in May, then I'm going to have to make the Algieri fight. So, I got kind of desperate as well and had to really pick someone and I thought a good venue for me would be New York. The Barclays Center is where they're having the biggest fights and to be there, and I have a huge fan base in New York was appealing."