confirmed Parker tested positive for traces of cocaine<\/a> and could face a lengthy ban from the sport.<\/p>\n“The Voluntary Anti-Doping Association (VADA) last night informed all required parties that Joseph Parker returned an adverse finding following an anti-doping test conducted on the 25th October in relation to his bout with Fabio Wardley,” Queensberry said.<\/p>\n
Parker has since posted on social media, insisting he is innocent of wrongdoing.<\/p>\n
“Before my recent fight, I took a voluntary test and have now been informed that it returned an adverse result,” he said. “This came as a real surprise to me.<\/p>\n
“I did not take any prohibited substance, I do not use performance-enhancing drugs and do not support their use.<\/p>\n
“I am co-operating fully with the process now underway and I am confident the investigation will clear my name.<\/p>\n
“Thank you to everyone who has sent messages of support. It means a great deal to me and my family.<\/p>\n
“When the investigation is complete, I will speak openly and answer questions.”<\/p>\n
Parker’s career is already in limbo, after a disastrous technical knockout decision in the 11th round against Wardley at London’s O2 Arena.<\/p>\n
The winner of that fight was being groomed as the next challenger for the undisputed world crown currently held by Ukrainian Oleksandr Usyk.<\/p>\n
Parker, 33, was apparently ahead on points, when the fight was stopped in the penultimate round.<\/p>\n
Sign up for Ng\u0101 Pitopito K\u014drero<\/a>, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Joseph Parker faces Fabio Wardley in October. Photo: Richard Pelham\/Getty Images Kiwi boxer Joseph Parker has refuted a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":285375,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,1590,63,802,1589,44,1591,1588,1586,1587,85],"class_list":["post-285374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-au","tag-audio","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-current-affairs","tag-news","tag-podcasts","tag-public-radio","tag-radio-new-zealand","tag-rnz","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=285374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/285375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=285374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=285374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}