Islam Makhachev has no interest in fighting Ilia Topuria in the Spaniard’s quest for greatness. By now it’s obvious that ‘El Matador’ is going the Conor McGregor route. With the featherweight title already on his shoulders, he now wants to become a two-division world champ by taking Makhachev’s lightweight title.
Funnily enough, Makhachev is also looking to become a two-division champion. If he defeats Arman Tsarukyan upon his return in January 2025, he will have defended his title successfully four times, surpassing his mentor Khabib Nurmagomedov. At this point, he will also have successfully defeated every one of the top 5 lightweights and there won’t be much for him to do other than look for that elusive second belt.
But when it comes to a potential showdown with featherweight contender Ilia Topuria, Makhachev is only interested if ‘people want to see him beat the ‘El Matador”. He has indicated that he had no interest in cutting himself down to featherweight for a title shot.
“If we look at it from a sports perspective, I’m not interested in Topuria….but if people want to see him lose, then we can make it happen. He fights in a different weight class. What will it give me? I don’t win the belt. Everyone will say, I beat a fighter from a lower weight class again.”
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As far as Topuria moving up a weight class to fight Makhachev is concerned, right now, he has bigger fish to fry in the featherweight division with Alexander Volkanovski already ahead of the queue looking for a rematch for the title.
So, unless, the two convince Dana White that they want to beat the life out of each other without any good reason, Topuria will go on to defend his title against ‘Volk’ and hopefully against fighters like Diego Lopees and Movsar Evloev in the future.
Makhchev, on the other hand, will look to move up in weight and look for bigger challenges. Right now, the only plausible destination for him seems to be the welterweight division but since his AKA comrade Belal Muhammad reigns supreme there, it’s not a fight he will entertain.
But that hasn’t stopped him from talking about some of the other challengers in the division.
Makhachev claps back at Covington
Colby ‘Chaos’ Covington has time and again gone on rants about Makhachev. Covington has not only refused to acknowledge what he has done inside the octagon but has also repeatedly insulted him by calling him a weight bully.
“I fight in my natural weight class because I know I’m the best fighter in the world…. Makhachev, who has to cut all that weight to have an advantage over m****ts and beat those guys up… I fight at my natural weight class.”
Makhachev had ignored most of these verbal jabs until he was specifically asked about it yesterday. And even then, he practically laughed it off and said,
“This is a man who can’t prove anything with his fights so he tries to be well-known with his tongue. He doesn’t talk about fighters who aren’t in the top 15. He talks about fighters who have achieved a lot to get some attention.”
This has not been a good week from Covington’s perspective. After claiming that he was willing to step in for Belal Muhammad and fight at UFC 310, Shavkat Rakhmonov called him out for not honoring his words. Ian ‘Machado’ Gary, on the other hand also called out Covington, claiming that he would be willing to fight him after a week of main eventing UFC 310 against Rakhmonov.
