By Edward Chaykovsky
British star Amir Khan (30-3, 19KOs) is heading into his debut fight on Premier Boxing Champions on May 29th at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. The Spike TV televised fight will see Khan step into the ring against former champion Chris Algieri.
Khan was last seen in the ring in December, when he dominated Devon Alexander over twelve rounds. Algieri was last in action in November, when he was decked six times in a twelve round decision loss to Manny Pacquiao.
If Khan wins, he will be a frontrunner to face Floyd Mayweather Jr., who says he will retire following a planned fight on September 12th.
Khan wonders if his impressive win over Alexander, combined with another impressive win over Algieri, will make Mayweather think twice and select another opponent.
Khan told The Express: “It was such a good performance against Alexander, maybe it would make an opponent think, ‘do I really need to fight him?’ You know, Mayweather has a lot of money and could go and fight someone else for the same kind of money. Even if his performance is good, Mayweather still doesn’t have to take the fight. He could think to himself ‘do I really need this fight, it’s going to be my last fight so why make it a hard, hard fight.’
“He is probably thinking that he is going to get paid the same and that is probably the thinking that Mayweather has got. But we are both advised by Al Haymon, so a deal wouldn’t be hard to do. But you can scare opponents if you put on a good performance. I have got my hands full with Algieri, but after this fight I can start putting pressure on Mayweather.”