By William Mackay: Right now WBA Super World light welterweight champion Amir Khan (24-1, 17 KO’s) is cocky and over-confident after dodging a huge bullet in the form of his close 12 round decision win over Marcos Maidana last December. It was like Khan tacking a homework project that he was putting off for months and then barely scraped by with a D- for his performance.

Khan, instead of looking at the fact that he almost got knocked out in the fight if not for the referee stepping in to separate Khan and Maidana during the crucial rounds late in the fight, Khan thinks he did a great job. He didn’t. The fight more than any others proved that Khan’s chin is fragile and he’s still very much as vulnerable to getting knocked out as he was after getting flattened by Colombian Breidis Prescott in 2008. Khan is now fighting unbeaten Paul McCloskey (22-0, 12 Ko’s) on April 16th at the M.E.N Arena, in Manchester, England.

The southpaw McCloskey has been picked out after a careful analysis of the top contenders in the division. McCloskey is currently ranked #5 by the WBA, but should probably be ranked well below that because of his total lack of experience against top level fighters. With that said, I still think McCloskey has a good chance of knocking Khan out in this fight because Khan is going to be wanting to show off more and won’t be respecting McCloskey’s power like he was Maidana. We’re going to see Khan going back to his style of fighting where he throws a lot of flurries to try and impress the fans and the judges.

This is going to be the perfect opportunity for McCloskey step forward and throw one of his hardest left hands straight down the middle to connect on Khan’s fragile temple area. It won’t take much power because Khan’s ability to take punishment will likely have diminished after the savage beating he took from Maidana. Khan can’t punch with any power when he’s throwing his meaningless flurries and his accuracy if terrible. All McCloskey has to do is wait Khan out.

Once he opens up with one of his flurries, McCloskey needs to spring his trap and fire down the middle to stagger Khan. As long as there’s not a referee working the fight that will step in to separate the action when Khan is being finished off, McCloskey should be able to put Khan out of his misery at that point.