By Edward Chaykovsky

Manchester legend and former world champion Ricky Hatton fully admits that his close friend, Amir Khan (31-3, 19KOs), has a very tough task on his hands on May 7th, when he faces WBC middleweight champion Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez.

Khan, who fights at welterweight, is moving up to a catch-weight of 155-pounds to challenge Canelo for his world title.

The event takes place at the newly built T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Back in 2011, Ricky sat ringside and watched his younger brother, Matthew Hatton, take a beating for twelve rounds from Canelo (46-1-1, 32KOs). That fight took place at 150-pounds, although Canelo failed to make weight and came in at 151.5-pounds.

Hatton gives Khan a chance to win, but says his countryman has a tough mountain climb in getting that upset. He wonders if Khan's lighting quick reflexes will follow him up to 155.

"He’s got a chance because he’s very fast on his feet and very fast on his hands. If there’s one thing that Canelo hasn’t got — even though he’s improved since the Mayweather fight massively — is the quickness of feet. He hits hard with both hands, he’s a good boxer, but his feet aren’t the quickest and that could be key," Hatton told On The Ropes Boxing Radio.

"Whether Amir keeps the speed of feet after going up through the weights remains to be seen, maybe he’s very fast at welterweight but do his feet move as fast when he moves up to middleweight? It will be interesting to see. It’s not an impossible job for Amir but he is up against it, and I think even Amir would say that."

"I hope Amir wins it and he has the capabilities of doing good, but I think he just needs to know that he has the tools to do it, but whether he has the same tools at middleweight as he did at welterweight, in speed of foot and speed of hand in order to keep that big man off. We’ll have to wait and see, let’s hope he can."