Amir Khan On Kell Brook- “My Time To Put Him In His Place”

Coming up Saturday night in Manchester, England, Welterweights Amir Khan and Kell Brook will finally square off in a main event that is several years past due. But, they certainly didn’t hold back at their final press conference on Thursday afternoon.

Khan, the former Unified Jr. Welterweight title holder, will come off a two+ year layoff to battle the former IBF World Welterweight titleholder Brook in a scheduled 12 rounder.

And, even though the bout has taken years long to get to this point, Khan revved up the rhetoric,

"I'm worried about Kell's health!" 😳

"He's been like a fanboy ❗"@amirkingkhan | @Boxxer | #KhanBrook pic.twitter.com/FEt02BOQMZ

— Sky Sports Boxing (@SkySportsBoxing) February 17, 2022

“It’s been going on for ten years,” Khan said. “This is my time to put him in his place.

“Kell has always been obsessed with my career – he’s been like a fanboy. I’ve been living in his head for such a long time.

“I’ve been having my own career. My dream was always to win a world title and then fight at the likes of Madison Square Garden and the MGM, have you face lit up on the Las Vegas Strip. Kell was campaigning over here. That’s the reason the fight didn’t happen.”  

“A lot of people might say it is too late, but this has been massive. I think it’s the right time.

“Knowing that this is going to be one of the biggest fights in Britain is going to give me that push too. I’m worried about Kell’s health after the beating I am going to give him.”

The 35 year old Khan is 34-5 and was last in the ring in July 2019 in a TKO stoppage of Billy Dibb but is more known recently for having lost on stoppage to WBO Welterweight champ Terence Crawford at Madison Square Garden three months earlier.

The Bolton native Khan also lost in a bid moving all the way to Middleweight to challenge to Canelo Alvarez on a brutal one punch KO in May of 2016.

Still, he distinguished himself as a World titleholder at 140 lb. earlier in the 2010s.

As for Brook, he too lost to Crawford on a TKO in November of 2020 and many believed that nearly 36 year old would be done at that point. This coming after his TKO loss in an IBF championship fight, where he suffered a fractured eye orbital against Errol Spence in May of 2017.  Brook had held the title for over three and half years.

For his part, the Sheffield native Brook said Thursday,

He made a mistake. This fight should have happened before Christmas but I knew it was going to happen (the delay), so I have been training all that time. I’m going to be in the best possible shape to destroy him.”  

 He went to the Olympics and got a big signing-on fee, we were with the same promoter, Frank Warren, and we were always promised that we would fight down the line.

“But he has said in many interviews ‘who is Kell Brook?’ He has never given me that respect. I don’t like Amir, he don’t like me. We are three sleeps away. He is definitely going to sleep Saturday night when I smash him in.”

The “war of words” is concluded and now we’ll see if either fighter has much left in this likely final main event for both former champions.