By Scott Gilfoid: In the latest boxing news, WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan (24-1, 17 KO’s) is in a state of denial about being hurt by Marcos Maidana (29-2, 27 KO’s) last Saturday night. Khan won the fight by a 12 round unanimous decision but was staggered twice in the 10th round of the fight and took tremendous punishment in the final three rounds of the fight without stop.

For some reason, Khan isn’t admitting he was hurt. It’s hard to buy his denial when he was clearly staggering and looking like a drunk after getting hammered by a big right hand. Later on in the 10th, Maidana staggered Khan for a second time with another big right hand when Khan made the mistake of trying to fight back rather than tie up. It’s so sad when a fighter refuses to admit they were getting their backside handed to them the way that Khan was. I wonder if it’s an ego thing.

In an article at the telegraph.co.uk, Khan said “I watched it twice. The judges had it a lot closer than it should have been. When I saw the fight I thought I won convincingly. He was hitting me with a lot of shots on my defense. I was landing the cleaner shots.” Unless Khan considers his head a part of his defense, I think he needs to sit down and watch his fight with Maidana for a third time and this time he needs to wear his glasses and look closely.

Maidana was teeing off on Khan in the last three rounds of the fight, and also landed effectively in other rounds. Khan showed defensive skills in the fight and mostly blocking punches with his head. Khan wasn’t landing the cleaner shots. He was landing the weaker shots and throwing a lot of slapping punches.

Khan said “He hit me with his best shot and it didn’t hurt me. When he caught me with that shot in the 10th, I knew exactly where I was. At no point was I gone. I was under pressure, I was hurt at times, he hit me on the back of the head a lot and I have a few marks there, but I came back and showed heart.”

Well, it looks like Khan just admitted he was hurt. I wonder if Maidana may be looked knocked loose some of Khan’s marbles, because he’s talking as if he’s mixed up. And, yeah, Maidana landed some punches to the back of Khan’s head, but only when Khan was holding Maidana by one of his arms and turning his back on Maidana to keep from getting hit in the head. If Khan hadn’t been holding onto Maidana’s arm, he wouldn’t have been hit. But turning his back on Maidana was Khan’s fault, not Maidana’s.

Here’s Khan’s best line: “I knew from day one I had a great chin…People keep saying I’ve got no chin. I’ve proved that by taking all these shots.” I hate to break this to Khan but he doesn’t have a good chin. If he did, he wouldn’t have been staggered twice in the 10th. And the reason why he wasn’t knocked out was because he was running for his life the entire fight.

Khan wasn’t standing in front of Maidana. He was moving all night long in big circles. That isn’t exactly proving you have a good chin if you’re moving continuously. Had Khan stood there in front of Maidana all night long and taken his best shots without getting staggered or knocked out, I then would agree with him that he has a good chin. But that’s not what Khan did. He ran, he held and the referee Joe Cortez separated him and Maidana when Khan was getting pounded on the inside.