LONDON, England —
Hamzah Sheeraz has broken his silence on accusations that he knocked out
Edgar Berlanga wearing illegal hand wraps — and says he takes it as a compliment.
Sheeraz despatched Edgar Berlanga in the fifth round of their super middleweight clash on the Ring III card in New York on July 12.
But within days, Berlanga’s wife Genesis Calderon uploaded a detailed carousel to Instagram in which she suggested that there was something suspicious about Sheeraz’s left hand wrap.
She claimed the discolouration of the wrap could be signs of "resin or epoxy" and called for the situation to be investigated. “Edgar went 12 rounds with Canelo [Alvarez] and came out looking better than he did here,” she wrote. “That says a lot.”
Now Sheeraz (22-0-1, 18 KOs), who moved up to No. 7 in
The Ring’s super middleweight rankings as a result of the victory, has addressed those accusations.
“It’s absolutely silly,” he told The Ring on Saturday night.
“It’s a compliment if anything because it goes to show that I gave him such a bad beating that they’re stooping so low to find an excuse as to why he got beat so bad.
“It’s not, 'Hamzah Sheeraz was the better man on the night,' and that’s it. They can throw as many accusations as they want.”
In what was arguably the best performance of his career, Sheeraz dropped Berlanga (23-2, 18 KOs) twice in the fourth round before he found the finish after just 17 seconds of the fifth.
He is now in line for a shot at the undisputed super middleweight title, held by Alvarez, who must first fight
Terence Crawford in Las Vegas on Sept. 13.Berlanga, 28, has lost two of his last three outings.