BoxRec

Lets be real guys - If Amir Khan was off a British ethnicity he would currently be the biggest thing in England. Khan's a 2 time world champion and an Olympic silver medalist yet most of his 'haters' are British fans. He was booed by a majority of British fans at the Froch Groves II event as he appeared on screen, which really confuses me, as Khan has represented GB in the Olympics and has carried the British flag on his trunks so there is no reason as a British fan to dislike them.

Now I wonder, why?

To be completely honest, I think the cause of this is the fact that he is an Asian boxer. Curtis Woodhouse acknowledged this a while back by tweeting that the main reason Khan is hated is because he is Asian (don't quote me word for word). And looking through Khan's tweets I have seen many racist remarks left by boxing fans.

I know I'll get a bunch of people giving me a thousand reasons to why this thread is nonsense, but this is how I feel.

Absolute nonsense.

Ian1973 wrote:Absolute nonsense.

Is it really though?

Explain why Naseem Hamed was so popular then?

Edited by mod

That could well be the case mate, its not something ive ever thought of as the race isnt the issue for me, but one thing I do remember at wembley was khan which fair enuff is trained by virgil hunter was in the americans corner who was facing james degale. If that was me I wouldnt of opted to be seen in the corner due to him fighting a fellow brit.

Also I think sometimes when fighters go to america, spend most of there time over there people dont have the interest in them, like they would if they were based in the uk all the time then went over there for the fights, also ive never known khan to be overly flashly about his britishness when hes in america never any sign of the flag on the walkout apart from a small patch on his shorts from what ive seen in his last couple of fights.

Just my opinion.

keirw wrote:Explain why Naseem Hamed was so popular then?
Prick

Explain why day in and day out Khan is receiving racist abuse on twitter by British boxing fans? (Don't believe it? Read his replies)
pudendum

Joellucketti wrote:That could well be the case mate, its not something ive ever thought of as the race isnt the issue for me, but one thing I do remember at wembley was khan which fair enuff is trained by virgil hunter was in the americans corner who was facing james degale. If that was me I wouldnt of opted to be seen in the corner due to him fighting a fellow brit.

Also I think sometimes when fighters go to america, spend most of there time over there people dont have the interest in them, like they would if they were based in the uk all the time then went over there for the fights, also ive never known khan to be overly flashly about his britishness when hes in america never any sign of the flag on the walkout apart from a small patch on his shorts from what ive seen in his last couple of fights.

Just my opinion.

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2 ... nik-boxing
http://www.express.co.uk/sport/otherspo ... cist-abuse
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/others ... laims.html

Im sure theres always going to be a small section of the public these days who are anti anything to do with islam and muslims, but I still stick by what ive said above.

That is crap

Khan is an arrogant twat, as is his family

Playing racism card is a cheap shot and a non argument

There are a few idiots everywhere, always will be but it's people like the opening poster that create race issues out of nothing with ridiculous rubbish like the opening post.

Aido wrote:That is crap

Khan is an arrogant twat, as is his family

Playing racism card is a cheap shot and a non argument

His family?
Can I ask where you got this piece of information from?...

Khans always seemed pretty sound when ive seen bits of him going round bolton etc. Does anybody know what station khans next fight is going to be on? Has it been announced yet? Looks a good fight and the card looks spot on.

keirw wrote:Explain why Naseem Hamed was so popular then?
Prick

As above.

Ricky_ wrote:

keirw wrote:Explain why Naseem Hamed was so popular then?
Prick

As above.

"Explain why day in and day out Khan is receiving racist abuse on twitter by British boxing fans?"

ArmaanCFC wrote: "Explain why day in and day out Khan is receiving racist abuse on twitter by British boxing fans?"

because those people who are giving him race relating abuse are guilty of racism...... pretty obvious really.

What you're suggesting is that it's the principal driving factor behind most people's reason for not supporting him........ I, as many, would disagree.

Amir Khan is sometimes disrespected because of his KO losses to Prescott and Garcia, and because some other people make him out to be better than he is.

He's an extremely overrated boxer, he's about the same level as Mike Dallas Jr and yet he receives a lot of attention and has a high profile.

vidal wrote:

ArmaanCFC wrote: "Explain why day in and day out Khan is receiving racist abuse on twitter by British boxing fans?"

because those people who are giving him race relating abuse are guilty of racism...... pretty obvious really.

What you're suggesting is that it's the principal driving factor behind most people's reason for not supporting him........ I, as many, would disagree.

I'm not speaking about all boxing fans, as the American fans seem to love Khan. Just the hardcore British fans who are obsessed with fighters like Callum Smith and Anthony Crolla.

If it's racism, then why do the Asian lads from Bolton I know also not like AK?
That isn't to say racism plays no part, but to solely say it's racism is naive.

ArmaanCFC wrote:

Ricky_ wrote:

keirw wrote:Explain why Naseem Hamed was so popular then?
Prick

As above.

"Explain why day in and day out Khan is receiving racist abuse on twitter by British boxing fans?"

And you think Naseem Hamed didn't get racial abuse from individuals either?

You seem to be confusing isolated incidents of racist abuse with widespread like/dislike within fan bases.

Khan still has alot of fans but it seems to me the widespread boxing fans in the UK dislike Khan for his personality, the ease in which he finds the canvas, because they think he is a con, and his matchmaking sucks. Unfortunately being firstly disliked, probably leads to a greater chance of the dislike then manifesting into some racial abuse afterwards, but it's not the other way around - people don't dislike Khan "because" of his ethnic background - otherwise the same people who dislike Khan would not have loved Naz.

fergusg wrote:To be honest there are quite a lot of fairly well-known British Muslims of varying skin complexions that seem to be adored by the British media… and these people all seem to have one thing in common - they aren’t frequently involved in controversy.
.

such as?

fergusg wrote:

Counter-puncher wrote:

fergusg wrote:To be honest there are quite a lot of fairly well-known British Muslims of varying skin complexions that seem to be adored by the British media… and these people all seem to have one thing in common - they aren’t frequently involved in controversy.
.

such as?

Nasser Hussain, Mo Farah, Naseem Hamed, Nina Hossain, 'Konnie' Huq, Zahra Ahmadi, Jan Uddin, Chris Eubank etc.

Edit: I'm talking about their current status.

Fair point

ArmaanCFC wrote:To be completely honest, I think the cause of this is the fact that he is an Asian boxer.

nonsense. boxing fans are rarely real racists. yes, they
flirt here and there with the idea, but nothing more.

amir khan raised big hopes and failed to deliver. he sat
himself next to manny and floyd before he was even close
to deserving being mentioned in one sentence with them.
and when he turned out to be "just" a top fifteen boxer, this
was disappointing big time.

nothing more to it IMHO.

man wrote:

ArmaanCFC wrote:To be completely honest, I think the cause of this is the fact that he is an Asian boxer.

nonsense. boxing fans are rarely real racists. yes, they
flirt here and there with the idea, but nothing more.

amir khan raised big hopes and failed to deliver. he sat
himself next to manny and floyd before he was even close
to deserving being mentioned in one sentence with them.
and when he turned out to be "just" a top fifteen boxer, this
was disappointing big time.

nothing more to it IMHO.

His career isn't yet over so we still don't know what he is capable of.

I always thought the 'everyone hates Amir Khan' angle was way overplayed to be honest. He's one of the few British boxers with a genuine crossover audience (just ask my mum - she loves him!) and I remember going to watch him fight Salita in Newcastle & the place was absolutely bouncing with support for him - loudest/most unanimously positive reaction I'd ever seen a boxer have first hand until Froch/Groves II.

For whatever reason the few dissenting voices that all boxers have just seem to be focused on more with Amir Khan. He has a large & legitimately national fanbase - most boxers would give their right arm for that.

fergusg wrote:

GooalaShooola wrote:I always thought the 'everyone hates Amir Khan' angle was way overplayed to be honest. He's one of the few British boxers with a genuine crossover audience (just ask my mum - she loves him!) and I remember going to watch him fight Salita in Newcastle & the place was absolutely bouncing with support for him - loudest/most unanimously positive reaction I'd ever seen a boxer have first hand until Froch/Groves II.

For whatever reason the few dissenting voices that all boxers have just seem to be focused on more with Amir Khan. He has a large & legitimately national fanbase - most boxers would give their right arm for that.

There are valid reasons why some of the British media look upon Amir Khan unfavourably. He’s been involved in quite a few controversies, which I listed on the first page of this thread.

I read, but like I said, I don't think that translates through to Joe Public. He is generally popular. I'd never heard of most of that stuff & I'm a boxing fan so what are the chances that casuals have?

I suppose it makes sense though that the only place I have heard a lot of negative feelings about AK is in Bolton itself, where you'd assume his 'out of ring behaviour' is more widely known.