Junior Fa: former professional boxer on Joseph Parker failing a drug test on the day of Wardley defeat

Kiwi heavyweight boxer Joseph Parker is protesting his innocence, after admitting he failed a drugs test on the day of his defeat to British boxer Fabio Wardley last month in London.

News outlets in the UK said the former world champion tested positive for cocaine.

Parker says it was a voluntary test and the adverse result was 'a real surprise'.

Former professional boxer Junior Fa says this development has come as a shock to New Zealand's wider boxing community.

"This is a bit of a shock in terms of lifestyle choice - and from the boxing world, Joe Parker is very, very beloved, everyone loves him. This comes as a shock to everyone."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudkin
from News Talks EDB.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
We're keeping with sport because the other big story in
New Zealand which broke yesterday is that Joseph Parker has
returned an adverse drug test result on the day of
his shock loss to Fabio Wadley in London. And Joe
he's back in New Zealand right now with the six
kids and he's shocked at the result. He couldn't believe it.
He's strongly denied any wrongdoing. He's vowing to clear his name.

(00:34):
So to talk about this, I've got former pro boxer
now boxing trainer and commentator Junior far You may remember
Junior himself faced Joe back in twenty twenty one. Junior,
good morning to.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
You, Good morning, good morning.

Speaker 2 (00:45):
This is completely unlike Joe.

Speaker 3 (00:49):
Yeah, I think this comes from a shock because of
what was found in his system. Now, I just want
to point out that even though as a band substance,
it's not considered a performance enhuising drug, so this is
completely for like you know, creational use. So this is
a bit of a shock in terms of like lifestyle

(01:10):
choice and from from the boxing world. Joe Parker is
very very beloved. Everyone loves him. Yeah, so this comes
to a shock to everyone. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:20):
Absolutely. I saw Eddie Hern on the TV last night
who said, this is absolutely not like Joseph Parker. That
was the first reaction I had. You know, this is
a family man, he's a good boy, and he's not
he's not a coke deer. But we don't even know
exactly what the drug is. What do you read into that?

Speaker 3 (01:35):
Yeah, I mean it's Yeah, I find it quite interesting.
I find it very interesting in terms of people's perception
of Joseph Parker and people's perception online in general. I
think this can this can really just sort people's image
of of of someone else social media media. But I

(01:58):
live in the day and age of like seeing as
believing you can put out whatever you want out there
and that's what people will believe, and so and and
so on saying that this, this to me doesn't really
come to as a big surprise only because of I
know who does hangs. Oh, I've been like there's a
there's a big influence of Tyson Fury, and there's also

(02:20):
a massive history there with with with with like drug
you see I'm not saying that you know who also
takes it, but when this came out, I'm just like, oh, shoot, okay, yeah, okay.
Maybe maybe there's a bit of like you know, influence there,
but in terms of like anything to do with the sport,
I think this is just yeah, this is this is

(02:41):
just odd only because of the time that it came
only because they tested them on the day of the fight,
and then it came back to kind of have some
kind of cocaine ingredient in there, and that's a big
shop because I'm just like, that doesn't seem right.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
So Joey's gonna fight this. Obviously, we've seen this happen
in many sports. Tennis is a big one. You know,
you get an accusction, then you fight, then they test
the sample again, and then it sort of goes to
tribune and then of course lawyers getting and it can
drag on for quite some time. And of course, if
you believe you're innocent, you're going to fight to the
to the end. And if they believe you're guilty, they're
going to fight to the end. So what happens to

(03:16):
Joseph now is he now on hold until this whole
issue is sorted out, Can he still carry on with
his career?

Speaker 3 (03:26):
Oh? I mean, especially in the sport of boxing, we'll
see this happened quite a lot, and it's but it's
mostly for worse things. It's mostly people getting popped for
performance enhancing drugs, So those are worse crimes. This isn't
as much of a bad crime. So so to me,
it's not that much of a big deal. I just
believe right now he's in basically no manzan. He's just

(03:49):
waiting for them to test test the other sample and
just kind of go from there. Whether whether they do
kind of instill the band, I don't believe the band
will be for a long period of time. There was
talks on possibly facing the two year band. I think
if you're going to face a two year band to
be for a performance enhancing drug, not a recreational one.

(04:09):
So if they do instill one, it will only be
for a few months, I believe.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
But you combine this along with the lost of Fabio
and the fact that he is thirty three years of age,
this has all been it's been a bad six months
for Joseph.

Speaker 3 (04:21):
Really yeah, I mean it's actually been like a bad
year for Joseph Parker only because he's been left in
the dark. He's been promoted wrongly. I believe he's been
He's in the camp of Frank Warren, who operates out
of Queensberry and England, and I believe that Queensbury, which

(04:44):
is England based, they put their fighters first. And Joseph
Parker has been in line to fight for the undisputed
title for a long time now and they never gave
him that chance. And then he finally got a chance
to possibly get in line for that, and then he
has taken out by five year Wardley. So for the
past year he's been on the back seat, just basically

(05:05):
waiting for his turn.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
So very very unlucky for Joe, no exactly, and that
also will motivate him to have one last big gig,
one last big fight. So there we go, Hey, Junior,
can I just say I went to the Joseph Parker
at Junior Far fight at Spark Arena, and at the time,
it was the biggest fight in the world because we
were the only place that was clear of COVID and
we were the only place that could have a stadium,
and it was It was a great night. Junior and

(05:27):
I thank you for that, and I also remember it
that just before the fight started, of course, all our
phones started doing the warning signal saying that the country's
about to Auckland is about to close down for COVID again.
So it was the last great hurrah and I walked
out of that going, well, that was a funny old
night goodness.

Speaker 1 (05:45):
That's right.

Speaker 3 (05:46):
I definitely remember that big time for the fight and
for that COVID warning as well. We thought that we
were out next, but we're going back in here. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (05:54):
I thought, yeah, it's going to be a drawing, they're
going to call the fight off, but no, we went
to the end. Hey, Junior, thank you so much for
your time today. That is Junior Far boxer now boxing
trainer and commentator, and we wait to see what happens
with

Speaker 1 (06:07):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin, listen
live to News Talks at B from nine am Sunday,
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