eldoberdanMMA<\/a> he\u2019s eager to head into enemy territory and took a shot at the world-famous Santiago Bernab\u00e9u Stadium in the Spanish capital of Madrid.<\/p>\n\u201cI want to fight Ilia, whenever, wherever,\u201d Pimblett said. \u201cI\u2019d love to come to Bernab\u00e9u and punch your face in. Do it in Spain in front of your fake countrymen because you\u2019re really German. I\u2019d love to come and punch your face in in front of 90,000 people in the Bernab\u00e9u in enemy territory for me because the Bernab\u00e9u is a shithole.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pimblett, a staunch supporter of the Liverpool soccer club, likely doesn\u2019t care if his jab ruffles the feather of Topuria or the legion of Real Madrid fans that regularly pack Bernab\u00e9u year after year. He\u2019s feuded with Topuria for years and after the two faced off following Topuria\u2019s lightweight title win over Charles Oliveira at UFC 317 in June, they appear poised for a future fight. However, UFC CEO Dana White is yet to commit to booking Topuria\u2019s next championship defense.<\/p>\n
When the time comes, Pimblett doubts their fight goes the distance.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can see so many ways that I finish him,\u201d Pimblett said. \u201cEveryone thinks that on the feet it would be a one-sided fight. I can see myself knocking him out. Kicks and knees and elbows. I\u2019m not going to do what Charles did and come out and have a boxing match with him, because I know he\u2019s a very good boxer. I respect his hands, I respect him as a fighter, he\u2019s very good. But once I get on top of him, he wouldn\u2019t get back up, he wouldn\u2019t be able to. I\u2019d elbow him that many times that he looks like The Elephant Man.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the thing, when I fight him, he\u2019s never fought with emotion before,\u201d Pimblett added. \u201cHe goes into every fight calm and calculated. With me, I\u2019m already in his head. He\u2019s not going to fight me like he fights everyone else. He\u2019s going to try and take my head off and he\u2019s going to get his head took off in the process.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pimblett is open to taking on another contender first and his name has been tied to bouts with Justin Gaethje and Arman Tsarukyan, though there has been little movement on bouts becoming official for any of them as of late.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s one reason why Pimblett believes it only makes sense for him to continue to call for the Topuria fight.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just want to fight anyone ranked above me, really,\u201d Pimblett said. \u201cIf it\u2019s not Ilia, I want a No. 1 contender fight, but I obviously want Ilia. He\u2019s got the belt. He\u2019s who I want to fight. I want to fight for a world title. I want to be the UFC world champion, so saying I want anyone other than Ilia is just stupid. Before he won the belt, I thought I would have to have one more and I thought it would be a No. 1 contender fight with Justin, but then he said he didn\u2019t want to fight me. So I just want to fight Ilia.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Paddy Pimblett isn\u2019t afraid to make a few enemies on his way to the top. The UFC lightweight…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166284,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,1347,785,85,787,1396],"class_list":{"0":"post-166283","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-latest-news","12":"tag-mma","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-ufc","15":"tag-ufc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166283\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}