By William Mackay: WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan (24-1, 17 KO’s) has decided to pick the European Boxing Union (EBU) light welterweight champion Paul McCloskey (22-0, 12 KO’s) as his next opponent to fight on April 16th rather than a fighter that could really test him.

This is a tune-up fight to presumably get Khan ready for a possible unification bout against HBO darling WBC/WBO light welterweight champion Timothy Bradley (27-0, 11 KO’s) later on in the year

In an article by Dan Rafael at ESPN, Richard Schaefer, the CEO of Golden Boy Promotions, seemed over-joyed at the thought of his fighter Khan facing McCloskey. Schaefer said “McCloskey is European champion and he has been calling out Amir. Amir had other fighters on his mind, but for his homecoming, to fight a guy from Northern Ireland who is undefeated, it makes sense. It’s an important showdown for the British fight fans and for Sky. McCloskey has yet to taste defeat. That makes him dangerous and motivated because he doesn’t know how to lose. McCloskey is licking his chops to get his hands on Amir. I heard that he wants to go and finish what Maidana started. Of course, Amir will have something to say bout that.”

It’s hard to take McCloskey serious as a puncher or an opponent for Khan, because of couple of reasons. First of all, McCloskey has never fought a first tier opponent during his six year pro career. There is no one close to being a 1st tier fighter on McCloskey’s resume. He may be ranked at number #5 by the WBA, but it’s hard to respect that ranking when you see McCloskey ranked over Zab Judah.

Sorry, but McCloskey is nowhere near as good as Judah and the WBA’s ranking is confusing and silly in my view. More importantly, McCloskey has no power to speak of and is more of an arm puncher with slow hand speed. He’s not going to “finish what Maidana started” because he’s missing the one ingredient that he would need to do that – power. McCloskey is merely an opponent that happens to come from the UK, and has an inflated ranking by the WBA.

This is a mismatch and it’s sad that HBO has agreed to show this fight on their network instead of looking at it for what it is – a mismatch.