By William Mackay: WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan (25-1, 17 KO’s) may not be aware of this or not but his fight against IBF light welterweight champion Zab Judah (41-6, 28 KO’s) may prove to be a much more riskier fight for the tender-chinned Khan than his bout last December was against knockout artist Marcos Maidana turned out to be. Khan barely survived the Maidana beating and ended up winning a close 12 round decision based on Khan’s better work in the early rounds of the fight.

Khan was badly hurt in the 10th by a right hand from Maidana and was badly punished in the last two rounds from the hard hitting Argentinian. Judah doesn’t throw as many punches as Maidana does, but Judah’s shots are thrown with more power and much better hand speed. If Judah connects cleanly with one of his big shots there is a good chance that he will either stun Khan or knock him clean out.

This is the problem that Khan and his trainer Freddie Roach have in this bout. How to keep Judah from landing his shots. The word on Judah is that he’s only a five round fighter and that he loses his power in the 2nd half of the fights. This has more or less been proven a number of times in the past four years. However, for Khan to get through the early part of the fight when Judah has one punch knockout power, Khan will almost have to be running constantly and not get hit once, because all it takes is one big shot from Judah and Khan may end up being stretched out on the canvas like he was in his 1st round knockout loss to Breidis Prescott in 2008.

Khan can run for at least nine straight rounds before he tires out completely. We saw that in his fight with Maidana. Khan literally ran for nine rounds until gassing out and getting knocked silly by Maidana in the 10th. But Judah is a lot better at cutting off the ring than Maidana and it’s going to be nearly impossible for Khan to avoid getting hit hard at least once by Judah in the first five rounds of the fight. That’s where the risk is for Khan. If his chin is still the glass-like one that Prescott shattered then Judah will crush him in the first five rounds. It will only take one shot from Judah to knock Khan cold, and it’s going to be nearly impossible for Khan to avoid getting hit in the early going.