By Jason Kim: In looking at some of the fights of Paul McCloskey (22-0, 12 KO’s) it’s easy to see why WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan (24-1, 17 KO’s) picked him out to fight on Saturday at the M.E.N. Arena in Manchester, England. McCloskey, 31, lacks power, hand speed or defensive ability. He’s there to be hit, not powerful and very slow. In other words, he’s the perfect opponent for Khan because he’s not much of a threat to land anything hard on Khan’s chin and have him staggering around the ring like he was in his last bout against Marcos Maidana in December. But don’t tell McCloskey that no one is giving him much of a chance in this fight, because he feels hes’ going to beat Khan and shock the world in this fight.

In article at Yahoo.com, McCloskey said “I always trust in myself but I’m going to shock the boxing world world this weekend when I’m victorious.”

For McCloskey to beat Khan he’s going to have to put pressure on Khan and really go after him early with power shots. If McCloskey allows Khan to move around the ring all night long throwing jabs and fast combinations, McCloskey will likely get cut up or stopped. The only way for McCloskey to beat Khan is to pursue him the way that Maidana did and hit him as hard as possible to either hurt him or make him scared to try and throw punches. If Khan is afraid to get hit, he will run all night long and tire himself out in the process. He’s no longer trained by Alex Ariza and we don’t know what the affects that will have on his ability to move around the ring continuously.

McCloskey has been taking on much lesser opposition than Khan during his career. In his last three fights, McCloskey has beaten Giuseppe Lauri, Barry Morrison and Daniel Rasilla. He didn’t look spectacular in beating these three fighters and was hit a lot. McCloskey almost asks to be punched because he holds his hands down by his waist when he fights, inviting shots. He’s able to lean away from some of them the way that WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko likes to do. But McCloskey still gets hit far too much for his own good and would be much better off changing his style of fighting by keeping his guard up to protect his head.