Shields Plans To Walk All Over “Soft” Habazin

After their fight was cancelled in October, the war of words between Claressa Shields and Ivana Habazin continued to simmer.

Now on January 10th, the two fighters will make their way to Atlantic City, New Jersey with the WBC and WBO junior middleweight titles on the line.

“She’s just another opponent,” Shields said to bjpenn.com of Habazin, who’s trainer James Ali Bashir was hospitalized after being the victim of a sucker punch from Shields’ brother Artis Mack. “She’s not anybody special and she may have worked her way up through the ranks to fight for these belts but our skills do not compare. I’m going to walk all over her. Skill wise, she does a lot of covering up and, I’m sorry, but she’s soft. I have no respect for the girl, she’s just soft. The only good thing I’ll say about her is she has good hand speed but she don’t have no head movement. My skills are just way above all of the women in women’s boxing.

“The [main] reason why she gets no respect is how she carried herself after the incident [at the weigh-ins in October]. She started playing the victim, trying to call me a thug, like I had anything to do with the incident. She wasn’t being a sports-like person, not understanding that we both trained hard to make that fight happen. The incident didn’t just affect her, it affected me also.”

Following the incident that saw not only Bashir hospitalized, but the fight cancelled and Shields’ brother arrested and charged with assault, Habazin did go on social media and make a litany of unkind statements towards Shields and her team.

“She went on this little race rant, I’m a thug, I’m a gangster,” Shields said of Habazin.

“I ain’t never been to jail. It made me not like her as a person and when I don’t like them as a person, I go out to put the beatdown on them worse.”

Shields-Habazin headlines a card airing on Showtime on January 10th from the Ocean Resort and Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey.