Alex Pereira is the new middleweight champion of the world, having defeated Israel Adesanya in a tensely fought match-up at Madison Square Garden.
Now that Pereira is the champion, he has a few exciting match-ups ahead of him, with big star power. Foremost, is the rematch with Israel Adesanya – despite having beaten him multiple times in kickboxing, Pereira will most likely have to go through the Nigerian-Kiwi yet again given “The Last Stylebender’s” aura at middleweight.
If that doesn’t happen immediately, Khamzat Chimaev will also be waiting for him. After Pereira’s spectacular win, Chimaev published a series of tweets of him asking to fight the Brazilian. Now, in shocking news, something deeper has been revealed by the middleweight champion himself, in his appearance on The MMA Hour.
Pereira doesn’t speak English – hence, what he said was put forward by his trainer. His trainer explained to Helwani that the Swede initially wanted to fight “Poatan” on the 10th of December, less than a month after his brutal weight cut for his UFC 281 bout, which is almost too soon for a turnover. Instead, Pereira proposed something else – “[I told my manager] ‘Tell the UFC I’ll challenge him to fight me at 205 [pounds] at UFC Rio [in January].’ Chimaev didn’t want to.”
Khamzat Chimaev trashes claims of him turning down the fight in Brazil, made by the champion Alex Pereira
Given the situation, Khamzat Chimaev pounced almost immediately onto the scene to deny Pereira’s claims and make his own version of the story clear. He wrote, “Wtf… I asked them about this fight in Brazil, fake belt fake Coach fake fighter.”
This is an interesting development of events – it would have been highly improbable that the UFC would have sanctioned a fight for Pereira hardly two months after his brawl with Adesanya. That being said, there does seem to be something missing from the picture here – both the fighters allegedly offered to fight each other in January.
If this match-up does materialize, fans will be in for a treat! Pereira is a knockout artist, but, Chimaev is definitely no slouch either, having managed to knockdown Gilbert Burns. What plays in the favour of the Swede is his superior wrestling, which he can use to inundate any offence from the Brazilian. We will wait to see if this fight gets booked anytime soon – surely, Dana White must also have this mega-fight on his radar.
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