08.09.08 – by James Slater – Quite amazingly, considering the brutal way in which he was despatched inside a minute by Colombian puncher Breidis Prescott on Saturday night, Amir Khan was back in the gym the very next day. In a successful attempt to show he is still as hungry as ever, the 21-year-old trained in his local gymnasium in Bolton only hours after being beaten, and KO’d, for the very first time.
“I want to show my friends and fans that I’m all right,” Khan told Sky Sports News as he headed to his gym. “Yesterday I was up against a tough fighter and at my status not many fighters would have taken that on. I took it on and maybe I rushed in, I’ve watched the video now and I know what mistakes I made. I might have been too excited – I wanted to get in there – especially against a big puncher.
“I could have done that to him, he could have done that to me, that’s what happens in boxing. A lot can change in a fight, he was cold, I was cold, but the big shot came in and he got me with some clean shots. It’s tough – you never want to get beaten in a fight but as I say I’m going to come back stronger – I’m still only 21 and I know how much talent I’ve got, and if I train hard, which I am going to do, I can rectify the mistakes. I’m happy it’s happened at this stage of my career because it could have happened later on when I might have been world champion. I’ll learn from my mistakes and I’m going to come back stronger.”
While it’s hard not to admire Khan’s pluck, it’s going to be one very long and hard road back. Nature really has played a cruel trick on Khan, giving him all the boxing skills in the world – speed, power, athleticism and courage and desire – but not the chin that is also needed to reach the top. Indeed, without a good chin, and there is surely no way Khan can ever develop one, the same thing that happened on Saturday night in Manchester will surely happen again as soon as Amir gets in the ring with another puncher.
The word is, according to promoter Frank Warren, that Khan will box again on December 6th. We wish him well, but it’s extremely unlikely he will ever get back what he once had.