By Phil D. Jay

John Breen, trainer of WBA light-welterweight title challenger Paul McCloskey says his man should not be considered the underdog when he takes on champion Amir Khan at the MEN Arena on April 16th and believes people will stand up and take notice when McCloskey rips the title away from the Brit.

European champion McCloskey, 31, has an impressive undefeated 22 fight record, with 12 stoppages over six years and Breen feels that former Olympic silver medallist Khan, may be guilty of taking the Dungiven fighter too lightly in the build-up to their title date in two weeks’ time.

“Everybody is asking me about how it feels to be the underdog but in my eyes Paul is the favourite because I know that he can beat Amir Khan. I have always felt that and nothing has changed,” Breen told The Belfast Telegraph.

“A lot of people seem to feel that Khan has improved but the only thing that I can see where he has developed is in his defence. That has improved since he went to America to train with Freddie Roach.

“But, having watched a lot of his fights you can see that he is still vulnerable. In his last fight he almost got stopped by Marcos Maidana and if he had been stopped by the referee in the 10th round nobody would have argued.

“Credit to him he stuck in there and took the shots and won the fight but you can see that he is still vulnerable. You can do all the training and conditioning you like but you can’t put muscle on the chin.

“I couldn’t be more confident about this fight. Paul has never been as strong, he has done everything that has been asked of him and by the time of the fight he will have sparred around 125 rounds.”

“Khan doesn’t have a plan B, so he’s going to be in big trouble,” added Breen.

24 year-old titleholder Khan, has just one defeat in 24 bouts and is already in talks with WBC and WBO champion Timothy Bradley about a possible three-belt unification in the late summer, but if Breen is correct in his prediction, it could be the Irishman who faces Bradley in America later this year.

Khan v McCloskey is live on Sky Box Office HD on Saturday April 16th from 8pm.
UK viewers can order this event for £14.95 by pressing the red button or calling 08442 410 888.

Some limited tickets are available by calling the MEN box office on 08448 478 0000 or online at ticketmaster.co.uk

US viewers can see a time-delayed screening on HBO as part of the Andre Berto v Victor Ortiz WBC welterweight title clash on April 16th at 10pm ET.

Phil D. Jay covers the boxing scene for worldboxingnews.net