By Daniel Tagg: WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan deserves credit for his recent win over challenger Marcos Maidana but I’m not sure how much. Khan started the fight not to badly, he then hurt Maidana with two body shots in the 1st which seemed a bit lucky as Khan’s punches shouldn’t have hurt Maidana’s body. Khan did okay for the next two rounds showing his speed and movement, his punches still lack any kind of power and Maidana landed some glancing blows that showed little affect.

From round three onwards, Khan’s running around caused problems for Maidana as he rarely had chances to land his bombs. Maidana also started to tire from her on, his seemed lethargic and ponderous. This tiring affect is probably due to the almost constant running by khan and the crippling body shots in the first round.

I think Khan was lucky to hurt Maidana in the first round and lucky he was. the body shots and the ref helped khan enormously in this fight. This is how I would have seen this fight going if things would have been more even. Khan would not have hurt Maidana to the body, this would result in the round being scored a draw, Maidana would not have been so tired during the rest of the fight so he would have at least won another round or two. Khan would also be taking more punishment and would have been wobbled sooner than round ten due to Maidana not being tired. He would have faster punches, Khan would either have been knocked out or would have lost on points by a couple of rounds.

Khan deserves credit for fighting Maidana but he still looks heavily flawed. He got fairly tired in the last 4 rounds, his defence has improved but look what happened in this fight, and he was lucky to hurt Maidana to the body. Khan was lucky to have the ref break up the close range fighting which would have had Khan receive more punishment and in the tenth round the ref broke up the fight when Maidana was about to knock khan to the canvas. Maidana would have fought at a higher pace throughout the fight and would have been hitting a lot harder. Khan was hurt throughout the fight by substandard and weak Maidana punches and was badly hurt in the last three rounds by a slow moving and punching Maidana. Khan would surely have been knocked out in this fight if there was a different referee who was staying out of the way of the action, and if Maidana wasn’t hurt in the first. The scores would have been different and Khan would have been knocked out. I also feel sorry for Maidana. He wasn’t able to fight his normal fight. The scoring was a bit off, and a draw is was it should have been and he was unlucky to have the ref keep breaking up the close range fighting. It wasn’t as if they were clinching constantly.

Khan should not have won that fight. He will get better but I can see him struggling with an opponent who has a good chin, speed and at least some power.