This Saturday, the highly
anticipated mega-fight will take place between the Lineal and WBC middleweight
champion Canelo Alvarez and former world champion, Amir Khan at the newly built
T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. This is Alvarez’s first defence of his title and
Khan’s first time fighting at the 155 lb catch-weight which means that there
are many questions which need answering come fight night and it should prove to
be a fascinating contest.
Boxing’s biggest star,
Canelo Alvarez has had an unbelievable career so far considering he is only 25
years old. Starting professional prize fighting at the age of 15, Canelo has only
tasted defeat once in his 48 fight career and that came against the unbeaten
Floyd Mayweather. He has beaten the likes of Josesito Lopez, Miguel Cotto and
James Kirkland on his way to becoming a two weight world champion.
However there are still
many questions that need answering of the Mexican. He has put in some very poor
performances against the more skilled operators of Floyd Mayweather, Erislandy
Lara and Austin Trout and at times looked almost clueless in the ring. It is
certainly true that Canelo looks a whole lot better against brawlers rather than
boxers and this will be a weakness that Khan will look to exploit.
HBO are billing this
fight as a classic power vs speed match-up and it is certainly true that Khan has
some of the fastest hands in the business. The man from Bolton became a star
overnight when he won an Olympic silver medal at just the age of 17 at Athens
in 2004. Since he turned professional Khan has an impressive record having beaten some of the biggest names
in the game such as Marco Antonio Barrera, Zab Judah and Marcos Maidana.
Khan has the reputation
of being in very exciting fights and this is more because of his weaknesses
rather than his strengths. Although he has unbelievable speed and timing, he
has one of the worst defences in the sport at the top level. He always seems to
be caught flush on his very questionable chin and has been wobbled by the likes
of Chris Algieri, Julio Diaz and Marcos Maidana. His lateral movement is very
poor and he always leaves his chin open to big shots after he has thrown his
flashy six or seven punch combinations.
This fight has received a
lot of attention and rightfully so considering these are two of the biggest
stars in the US. However, this fight is a total miss-match and many people have
seemed to miss this point because of the fact that the fight is so left-field
and was announced out of nowhere that fans and pundits have failed to give it
their full analytical attention.
Although Khan will not be
as weight drained as he was when he was at 140 lb his chin is still one of the
worst in the business and Canelo has devastating punching power at
light-middleweight. Khan is stepping up two weight classes and he is yet to
fight a world class operator at welterweight let alone at light-middleweight or
middleweight. This is a perfect fight for Canelo as it is against a big name so will bring in a large pay-check and due to Khan's punching power it has very little risk attached to it.
With this fight it is
more a question of when rather than if because it will be lights-out Khan as
soon as Canelo lands flush. Khan could have some success early on in the fight
but at some point he is going to leave his chin open as he always does however
this time he is not facing Chris Algieri or Devon Alexander he is facing a
fighter who possesses genuine power. He does not have the defensive skills of a
Lara or a Mayweather to keep Canelo at bay so I am predicting an early-middle
round stoppage for Canelo.
Prediction:
Canelo Alvarez KO
Tom Eckett
@boxingguru44
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