By William Mackay: WBA Super World light welterweight champion Amir Khan (24-1, 17 KO’s) says he will be sparring with Manny Pacquiao to help get ready for Khan’s bout against unbeaten southpaw Paul McCloskey (22-0, 12 KO’s) at the M.E.N. Arena next month on April 16th in Manchester, England.

Khan, 24, says he’s not overlooking the 31-year-old McCloskey, but it’s hard to belief Khan at his word with him constantly talking about his unification bout against WBC/WBO light welterweight champion Timothy Bradley in July, and Khan’s plans after that to move up to the welterweight division to try and get a fight with Floyd Mayweather Jr. and/or Shane Mosley.

When a fighter is already planning one to two moves ahead of their next scheduled fight, that tells you that they’ve already mentally chalked up their next fight as a win and are looking past that opponent.

Perhaps what makes Khan so confident in this case is that McCloskey is a hand-picked opponent, someone without power and speed, and who has never fought a top tier opponent during his career. McCloskey has a high ranking by the WBA, but his ranking is meaningless without him having fought anyone noteworthy.

I’ve seen McCloskey fight on several occasions and was struck by how slow he was and how easily he got hit. I further was disappointed when I saw McCloskey get staggered by one of his 2nd tier opponents. That suggests that Khan has picked out his opponent wisely and should win this fight unless his chin has been weakened by his close win over Marcos Maidana last December.