Roach‘s prediction is based on his assessment of Pacquiao’s last fight against Jessie Vargas last year at the Thomas & Mack Center, Paradise, Nevada.
Pacquiao has not scored a knockout win for the last eight years since his last KO win against Miguel Cotto of Puerto Rico in 2009. But he has scored multiple knockdowns in almost all of his last six fights since his loss to Juan Manuel Marquez in 2012.
In his conversation with Jenna Jay of OTR Boxing, Roach said he saw Pacquiao’s resurgent killer instinct when he knocked down Vargas twice on the way to a unanimous decision victory to regain his WBO welterweight belt.
When asked what he would feel if Pacquiao fails to knock out Horn on July 2, Roach said Pacquiao’s killer instinct is back as he had seen in the fight against Vargas and he promised to push Pacquiao in training camp to be certain that he scores a knockout.
“Yeah, I think Manny needs to fire up this time. This guy is a good puncher and he will trade with you. Manny can still punch and he has that killer instinct back, I saw a little bit of it in the last fight, he looked better than he had in a while and he’s starting to get that old offense going and I’m going to be pushing that in training camp the whole time,” Roach said.
In the same interview, Roach said Pacquiao is still on top of his game at 38. His work ethic is still the same and he doesn’t take anyone of his opponents lightly.
“He’s still very good, his work ethic is great. He works hard for every fight, he doesn’t take anyone lightly and he works really hard. His work ethic is still like it was the first day I met him. We’re going to go out there and I think demolish this guy, which is what we need to do,” he added.
Meanwhile, Philippine broadcasting giant ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corporation has announced over the weekend that it has gained exclusive pay broadcast rights of the “Pacquiao-Horn” fight for the Philippines.
