Britain's Amir Khan now wants to fight the unbeaten Floyd Mayweather for the world title after he took a unanimous decision victory over Chris Algieri in a welterweight matchup.
The youngest British Olympic boxing medalist, Amir Khan, somehow was always the bridesmaid when it came to a fight with pound-for-pound king and welterweight champion Floyd Mayweather.
Khan, who won silver at the 2004 Athens Olympics at the age of 17 has been chasing this fight for more than a year now. Though Mayweather teased him about a possible fight three times, he ended up picking Marcos Maidana twice as an opponent before finalizing the highly-publicized showdown with Manny Pacquiao, whom he beat earlier this month.
That being said, it looks like Amir Khan might be the bridesmaid no longer.
Despite looking defenseless at times, especially early, Khan picked it up in the second half of the fight and emerged winner after a unanimous decision victory against Chris Algieri in their welterweight main event Friday night before 7,372 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, according to reports on ESPN.
Floyd Mayweather (48-0, 26 KOs) on the other hand intends to fight again on Sept. 12 in order to close out his six-fight contract with CBS/Showtime, and he needs an opponent.
Amir Khan is no doubt a high-profile rival and probably the most dangerous too. Title holder Keith Thurman is scheduled for a fight on July 11 and therefore will not be available. Also, junior welterweight champion Danny Garcia is not quite a serious consideration and he might be fighting on Aug. 1, too.
Former welterweight titleholders Shawn Porter and Adrien Broner who are fighting each other on June 20, do not have the profile of Khan, who can bring big huge money to the table as a result of television revenue in his native England.
Basically, Khan might be the right opponent, especially after his victory, although he looked vulnerable enough that Mayweather might be interested.
Khan said, "I think everybody knows Amir Khan wants to fight Floyd Mayweather. Mayweather is a champion, so let's make it happen."
Expressing his keenness, Khan screamed in the ring, "Amir Khan wants to fight Floyd Mayweather. I want that next. I'm number one World Boxing Council (challenger).
However, that might be easier said than actually done, The Times of India noted.
As mentioned earlier, Floyd Mayweather decided to fight Argentina's Marcos Maidana in May last year when Amir Khan thought he might fight the US star.
Talking about his recent victory, Khan said the support from the crowd helped him push to the finish and eventually secure the decision.
"He come to fight, wanted to win, had his home crowd, but I came here to win," Khan said, adding he had to resort to "Plan B" to defeat the hometown hero."
"The crowd really fired me up the last three rounds when Chris really came at me hard," Khan said.
