Devin Haney: Lightweight champion denies being racist after claiming he would ‘never lose to a white boy’
WBC champion said ‘Fight a white boy 10 times, I’m going to beat him 10 times’ in reference to Vasyl Lomachenko
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Your support makes all the difference.WBC lightweight world champion Devin Haney has denied being racist and says he rejects “discrimination of any kind” after claiming he “would never lose to a white boy”.
Haney, 21, made the comment during an interview when asked about the possibility of facing Ukrainian world champion Vasyl Lomachenko.
Speaking to 78SportsTV, Haney said: ”I’ll tell you this. I will never lose to a white boy in my life. I don’t care what nobody got to say.
“Fight a white boy 10 times, I’m going to beat him 10 times.”
Haney’s comments received a fierce backlash on social media, with 135lbs rival Ryan Garcia writing: ”We should all respect everyone from every race and see who the best man is!
“I respect Devin Haney and I believe he didn’t mean this with racist intent but let’s all respect each other for the love of the sport.”
Haney later responded to the criticism and said: ”I’m not racist and I never will be a racist. I’m chasing greatness.”
He then added: “I just had a very positive conversation with Mauricio Sulaiman, president of the WBC, and confirmed to him directly my commitment to be a role model and my absolute rejection of discrimination of any kind.”
Haney won the WBC lightweight title last year but was declared ‘champion in recess’ due of injury.
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