Boxing: Harrison weighs up pursuit of new title

Harrison retained his WBO featherweight title for the sixth time in his second reign and Khan moved to three wins from three fights as a professional.

Harrison took two rounds to find his range against Australia's Nedal Hussein and then, from the third, slowly wore Hussein down for a lopsided unanimous decision. However, there were rounds when silence greeted the repetitive action in the ring, which is odd considering 6,000 people had paid to watch. Some even left the arena in the last few rounds.

When it was over, Harrison's manager, Frank Maloney, sent a mixed message of his own to both his fighter and the fans in Scotland.

"Scott wants to fight his mandatory challenger [Juan] Guzman but I think he should go to super featherweight,'' said Maloney. "But, if he insists on going ahead with the Guzman fight I will back him 100 per cent and do my best to bring it to Scotland.''

Harrison has always denied that boiling down to nine stone is a problem but, for the first time on Saturday, he contemplated a move to super featherweight, an increase of a crucial four pounds.

"If they can get me a super featherweight world title fight I would move up,'' admitted Harrison. "I can still do featherweight and I'm strong for 12 rounds. I'm a champion now and I'm not about to become a contender at a new weight.'' One option is a meeting with Edinburgh European super featherweight champion Alex Arthur.

If leaving an arena when the local boxer is defending his title is odd, the reaction to the referee's intervention after 49 seconds of round three of Khan's fight with Steve Gethin, was close to disgraceful.The crowd immediately booed and some empty plastic bottles were thrown at Khan's fans.

Meanwhile, Vitali Klitschko has torn a ligament in his right knee and Saturday's WBC heavyweight title fight against Hasim Rahman in Las Vegas has been scrapped.