By Scott Gilfoid: Former IBF/WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan wants revenge so bad he can taste it for his 12 round split decision loss last weekend to Lamont Peterson. Although he says repeatedly that he’s not one to cry about the decision, Khan says he believes there was something suspicious going on with the scorecards, saying to the Manchester Evening News “One of the Golden Boy guys got the score sheets and it said ‘Khan, Khan, Peterson’ and next thing it was ‘Peterson, Peterson, Khan.”

Khan may say he’s not still crying about his loss, but it sure sounds like it to me. He needs to keep a stiff upper lip and come to terms with the fact that Peterson whipped him and he was forced to foul in order to survive. I can’t remember seeing so many fouls in my life from a fighter. Khan pushed off on Peterson over 50 times, which is highly illegal. And if I had a dime for every time I saw Khan grab Peterson around the neck to either pull him forward or wrap in a headlock, I imagine I could afford to go watch and movie at the theaters and buy some refreshments.

Khan was like an octopus with his grabbing, holding and shoving. Referee Joe Cooper did Khan a huge favor by only docking him two points. If I was the referee in there, Khan would have been disqualified so fast his head would have been spinning for all of his fouling he did last Saturday.

Khan really wants the rematch with Peterson now and is pushing his people to make that happen as soon as humanly possible. But he may have to put a sock in it, because Peterson has to look out for his owns self. He needs to get a fight or two in between a rematch so he can milk his titles for a while. I mean do you honestly think Khan would have bothered fighting Peterson again so soon if he were to have won by a slim margin? You’d probably be an old man by the time Khan ever showed interest in fighting Peterson again. It doesn’t matter how close the margin is, Khan isn’t into giving rematches. This is why Peterson needs to let Khan stew a while.

Khan said “Beating him will be great. He is the one who will have to suffer. I’m going to work hard now and change things I did in the ring.”

Is Khan talking about brushing up on his fouling techniques or what? Khan certainly can’t be talking about trying to learn how to fight on the inside, can he? If he is, he’s kidding himself because you can’t learn how to fight on the inside in four months or however long it is between rematches. It takes years to become good on the inside and you have to have the mindset for that kind of game. You have to be able to overlook getting hit a lot, and you also have to possess a good chin. I don’t think Khan has the heart or the chin for fighting on the inside, so there won’t be any improvement in that area.

If Khan is talking about his fouling, well then I guess he can improve in that area. In looking at his fight with Peterson, as well as his fights against Marcos Maidana and Zab Judah, I think Khan’s fouling gives him a big boost. With his ability to foul by pushing off, holding and hitting, pushing down on his opponent’s heads and putting them in headlocks, Khan is able to negate an inside fighter. He doesn’t even need to learn how to fight on the inside because he simply pushes his opponents off when they try to crowd him.

If the referee is allowing him to do this, which is what had been the case leading up to his fight with Peterson, Khan gets a huge advantage with the fouling. It’s like a short basketball player being given a stool to climb up on to slam dunk the basketball rather than having to try and leap high enough on his own to ram the ball into the basket. Being able to get away with pushing off and/or pushing your opponents’ heads down, really disguises Khan’s lack of defensive and inside fighting skills. With the right referee working the fight to ignore his fouling, Khan doesn’t need to develop these skills because he’s able to get away negate them.