The Filipino Manny Pacquiao, universal boxing icon and former senator, denied this Friday that he had cheated during a decisive fight in the year 2000, after a referee from the country declared that he helped him win the fight.
“I didn’t cheat. Probably (the referee) favored me for fighting at home,” Pacquiao told local outlet Tv Patrol on Friday, defending himself against Filipino referee Carlos Padilla’s allegations that he received help. during a fight against Australian Nedal Husseinplayed in October 2000 on the outskirts of Manila.
Padilla admitted, in an interview published by the World Boxing Council (WBC, in English) last week, who intentionally favored Pacquiao in that fight giving him more seconds to recover from a KOand confessed that he did it because “many Filipinos were watching the fight.”
However, Pacquiao – who later recovered from the knockout and ended up prevailing over Hussein to win the WBC bantamweight title – rejected the statements and assured that, as a boxer, he only did “what he had to do.”
“I am a boxer, I just do my job inside the ring. That (the trap) is his problem, not mine.”added the 43-year-old Filipino boxer.
The controversial fight is considered key to Pacquiao’s brilliant career, since thanks to it he was able to defend the bantamweight title twiceas well as changing categories and facing super bantamweight champion Lehlo Ledwaba in 2001, in a fight that would catapult him to international fame.
Pacquiao established himself in the world of boxing as the only winner of twelve world titles in eight different categories and, throughout his career, he rose champion at flyweight, super bantamweight, featherweight, super featherweight, lightweight, super lightweight, welterweight, and super welterweight.
In 2010, he began to combine the ring with politics after being elected congressman and, six years later, senator, although he finally hung up his gloves last year to dedicate himself to the campaign for the presidential elections of the Philippines, in which he obtained 3.6 million votes but was defeated by the current president, Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
