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| From Parry's official website (file photo) |
By Ivan Saldajeno
MANILA--Victor Cui announced on Tuesday night that Chi Lewis-Parry was not cleared for his supposed One heavyweight title fight against Brandon Vera and had to be replaced by Paul Cheng.
Moments later, Vera threw some verbal jabs at Parry in a video for failing to submit necessary medical records to become eligible to fight on Friday night in the main event of One: Spirit of Champions at the Mall of Asia Arena.
Parry, however, insisted that everything being said by the organization is false.
The British fighter called One Championship a group of liars and blasted the organization for "bogus accusations" about him losing a chance to fight Vera for the inaugural heavyweight belt.
Parry's statement on Tuesday said, "Dear world. As I forewarned, One Championship have ripped my shot from my grasp. They pretended Paul Cheng was travelling to Manila just for media obligations and lied to every single fan! Now they have made up their excuse (which has taken them days to form) and are blaming me with bogus accusations. It's disgusting that an organisation claiming to be one of the top competitors in the world are happy to pull stunts like this.... I'm sorry for the fans that have been lied to by Victor Cui and One."
It turned out, Parry heard the news first before the press got a word as he released his statement on his Facebook account at 3:04 p.m. of Tuesday (Philippine Time).
Dear world. As I forewarned, One Championship have ripped my shot from my grasp. They pretended Paul Cheng was...
Posted by Chi Lewis-Parry on Tuesday, December 8, 2015
Cui announced the Cheng substitution at exactly 10 p.m.
[Related Story: Cheng to replace Parry at Spirit of Champions main event]
[Related Story: Cheng to replace Parry at Spirit of Champions main event]
Parry also said that he will seek legal action for the said matter.
He vowed, "Legal action is to follow and the exploitation and misrepresentation of fighter/athletes will stop at One Championship for good!"
The sudden change of the main event fixture and Parry's take on it came at the heels of another sudden schedule amendment in a previous One fight card in Singapore last month, when the supposed rematch between Ben Askren and Luis Santos for the welterweight title was called off when the latter failed to make weight.
Santos, in an email sent to Dugout Philippines last week, said that getting to the weigh-in two pounds over the 170-pound limit was due to the constant changing of the date of the match but insisted One was behind the continuous schedule switching, denying Askren's public claims that it was him and his team who are behind the gameday tweaking.
Follow him on Twitter: @IvanSaldajeno
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