The sentence has been changed to an indirect speech as follows:
In simple terms, an indirect speech means a reported speech. When reporting a speech, the words are framed to be in the past tense because it is assumed that the events happened in the past.
So, when incorporating the verb denied, the provided sentence can be rephrased as shown above.
Learn more about the indirect speech here:
https://brainly.com/question/15886943
#SPJ1