“Worst Kept Secret”: Fans Joke as UFC Yet to Officially Confirm Islam Makhachev vs Arman Tsarukyan for UFC 311

Islam Makhachev will face Arman Tsarukyan in a highly-anticipated rematch for the lightweight title at UFC 311 in January 2025. This is all but confirmed. However, after months of both fighters’ camps talking about specifically preparing for each other, the UFC is waiting till the 11th hour to make the official announcement, much to the amusement of the fans waiting to be told the sky is blue.

The two fighters had fought back in the day in 2019. Tsarukyan, greener than herbal tea at the time, had actually managed to push a title contender like Makhachev at the time. Even though the fight had ended up in a unanimous win for Makhachev, each of the three rounds had been scored at 10-9, making it an extremely close match.

Cut to 5 years later, when Tsarukyan defeated Charles Oliveira at UFC 300, in another closely contested fight, he had all but booked his ticket for a title shot against Makhachev. Both fighting camps have since been preparing for each other. Back in October, the #1 contender had even claimed that, unlike Khabib Nurmagomedov, Makhachev was actually beatable.

“Islam is really good everywhere, But it’s not that there’s an aspect where you can’t outsmart him. Unlike prime Khabib – he was too good at wrestling that it would’ve been really hard to beat him in that area. “

Makhachev, of course, has been rather dismissive of the fighter’s potential to change the results of their fight when they have the much-anticipated rematch.

“I saw a lot of his fights, he just speaks. He speaks good, he promotes himself. But he’s the same fighter and it’s not exciting match for me but we will fight soon.”

Earlier last week, Makhachev’s manager Rizvan Magomedov had also talked about how they were preparing for the champ’s return and while nothing had been signed, there were certain assumptions.

“For now, we’re preparing for January 18. We were given the date, and we accepted it. We assume it will be Tsarukyan.”

Of course, none of this means anything if the UFC doesn’t officially put their stamps and signatures on the dotted lines… which they are expected to do soon. But given that it’s already December, fans have been rather hilarious in their response.

One fan responded to an MMA page confirming the fight of their own volition and said, “OMG WHAT I COULD’VE NEVER SEEN THIS COMING.” According to one fan, since everyone knows this was going to happen, it is UFC’s “Worst kept secret”.

This fan just trolled the UFC by saying, “UFC fax machine started working”!

In the meantime, Makhachev has been busy training after returning from a hand injury. Unfortunately, he seems to have been visibly irritated by featherweight champion Ilia Topuria’s repeated callouts.

Makhachev won’t fight Topuria unless…

From Makhachev’s perspective, it’s all about legacy, and defeating Topuria, a champion in a weight class below him doesn’t make any sense.

In an interview, the Dagestani champion argued that he would only fight the featherweight champion under one condition!

“If I beat him, what will that do for me?… Everyone will once again say that I beat a featherweight…But if people really want to see him lose, then we can do it.”

Makhachev wants to move up in weight class and get that elusive second title. But that isn’t happening at welterweight since his AKA training partner Belal Muhammad already reigns supreme there as the champion. This leaves the middleweight division but as the champion of that division Dricus Du Plessis had humbly put it, ‘It’s good to dream big but I am very big’.

This leaves Makhachev with the featherweight division and the Topuria fight. Not that that won’t be a task for him since it will require him to cut some serious lbs just to make weight. So, for now, Tsarukyan is the best option there is for the UFC lightweight champion.