UK Anti-Doping have announced that Amir Khan has received a two year ban from boxing after testing positive for a banned substance.
He will also be prohibited from all other sport, with the test result reportedly coming after his loss to Kell Brook in February last year.
He argues that he did not mean to take the substance – an anabolic agent called ostarine – and alleged that he had not intentionally ingested it.
Speaking to Sky News, Khan said, “I am a retired fighter. You can see by my performance against Kell Brook [that it] wasn’t the best. I lost the fight. If I went in there and knocked Kell Brook out it is different. I have never cheated in my life, I am the one who wanted the testing done.
“The amount that was in my system could have come from shaking peoples’ hands. I don’t know what the drug was in my system. I will give my views, but, like I say, I have never cheated in my life. I would never cheat. I am a retired fighter, and I have got this two-year ban now, which is quite strange. I have already retired anyway. No comeback plans at all.”
An independent tribunal has accepted that Amir Khan did not commit “deliberate or reckless conduct” and shortened the standard four-year sentence with that in mind.
[Image via Shutterstock]