Floyd Mayweather gives his reaction after watching the now well circulated sparring clips between Conor McGregor and Paulie Malignaggi.

Floyd Mayweather might lead on that he never watches footage of his opponents and doesn’t have a gameplan going into his fights, but he definitely does – and always has.

He’s no fool and knows that anytime he steps into a professional boxing ring presents serious risk even for a defensive wizard like him.

A lot has been made about the sparring footage that is frequenting the internet at the moment of Mayweather’s next opponent Conor McGregor and former world champion Paulie Malignaggi.

One clip does appear to show McGregor scoring a knockdown on the New Yorker – although not a clean one it must be said.

Speaking in a media day open forum recently Mayweather gave his take on what he saw:

 “I had a chance to see it, I thought it was real interesting but there was a lot of rabbit punching, illegal rabbit punching behind the head.

He added:

“A lot of the shots were illegal, a lot of grappling, a lot of wrestling, a lot of illegal shots.”

One suspects that everything McGregor does on fight night is going to be scrutinised to a tee due to him crossing over from a different sport.

Former Mayweather opponent Ricky Hatton pointed out this week that McGregor, if he’s to have any chance at all, will need a referee who is lenient and lets him fight his fight.

Knowing the unified boxing rules will be absolutely crucial for McGregor as he looks to implement his unorthodox boxing style.

McGregor has enlisted the help of renowned boxing referee Joe Cortez in the run up to the bout to help familiarise him with professional boxing rules come August 26th against Mayweather:

(Hat tip Helen Yee)