By William Mackay: If former IBF/WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan wants an immediate rematch with Lamont Peterson then he’s going to have to hope that Peterson agrees to make the fight rather than face WBO light welterweight champion. The International Boxing Federation decided not to force an immediate rematch between Khan and Peterson after reviewing the fight upon an appeal made by Khan last week.
Khan appealed to the WBA, IBF and the Washington State Athletic Commission to have the fight result overturned and/or an immediate rematch ordered. The IBF said no to the rematch, but the WBA and Commission still haven’t said what they’ll do.
IBF chairman Lindsay Tucker said to ESPN.co.uk “We found no discrepancies that would affect the outcome of the result of the fight. We decided not to order an immediate rematch on the basis of the fact that in the rules, if a referee feels that it’s a foul, then that’s his call to take a point. He did warn Khan several times before he actually took the first point.”
It’s true that the referee did try to give Khan a heads up that he needed to stop shoving Peterson, but Khan ignored the referee’s warnings and continued to shove Peterson around. It took until the 7th round before the referee finally took a point away from Khan for pushing off. But that didn’t alter the way Khan fought, as he continued to push off for the remainder of the fight, even continuing after a second point deduction in the 12th. It seems that pushing off has become so much of a part of Khan’s game, like his head bending habit, that he can’t seem to stop even when given warning and point deductions.
Khan may not need the IBF, WBA or the Washington State Athletic Commission to force Peterson into a rematch, because he seems to already have figured out that it might be more logical to take the bigger money to face Khan again then the smaller money to take on Timothy Bradley in what would likely be a much more risky fight. Bradley really had Peterson’s number two years ago in a one-sided 12 round decision win, and it’s likely that Bradley would still have the advantage over Peterson even now.
Peterson might be much better off facing Khan again, taking the bigger money and pressuring him even more than last time. It doesn’t appear that Khan is learning a lot from working with Freddie Roach, so it’s very likely he’ll make the same mistakes as he did last time when getting heavy pressure from Peterson. Khan seems stuck in his ways unable to change.
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