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Brit boxing teen claims medal
Athens - Britain's sensational 17-year-old Amir Khan has won at least an Olympic boxing bronze medal after stopping South Korea's Baik Jong Sub in just 1min 37sec to reach the lightweight (60kg) semi-finals.
And now he believes he can go all the way to become the youngest Olympic boxing champion since Floyd Patterson at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics.
He caught Baik with a right to drop him once and then another flurry of punches won a second standing count of eight and it was all over for the Korean as the referee stepped in to stop the fight with 23 seconds of the first round remaining.
Khan fights Kazakhstan's Serik Yeleuov on Friday for a place in Sunday's final after the 23-year-old outpointed Italy's Domenico Valentino 29-23.
His opponent for a gold medal should be Mario Cesar Kindelan Mesa, the 33-year-old Cuban defending champion, who survived a second-round knockdown to regain his composure before beating Rovshan Huseynov of Azerbaijan 23-11 in his quarter-final.
"It's great just winning a bronze medal," said Khan. "When I came here I was just proud to be a 17-year-old representing Great Britain, thinking about the next Olympics but now I feel I can get into the finals.
"The pressure is off me now and I'll be a lot more relaxed, more cool-headed. I'll get better."
And he was relishing the prospect of having the chance to match Patterson who won the middleweight gold medal at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics when he was a month younger than Khan.
"At that time you didn't have to qualify. I feel I can do what he did as well," Khan said.
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