Michael ‘Venom’ Page will face Jared Cannonier at Middleweight at UFC 319, a matchup that, to some fans, seemed to come out of left field. This is a shift from his original plan to return to Welterweight after his fight with Shara Magomedov, who he defeated in February via unanimous decision. Speaking with MMA Fighting, MVP explained the decision came down to opportunity, and the lack thereof at 170.<\/p>\n
I wasn\u2019t getting the welterweight fights I wanted. Middleweights were more willing to face me. <\/p>\n
– MVP<\/p>\n
Despite originally eyeing 170lbs, Page decided to \u201cgo where the smoke is\u201d and believes 185 offers a more exciting path forward.<\/p>\n
Looking beyond UFC 319, Page expressed interest in a future clash with Leon Edwards in the UK.<\/p>\n
I still think a fight with Leon Edwards is a great fight for the UK. I\u2019d 100% accept that fight. <\/p>\n
– MVP<\/p>\n
Leon Edwards has lost his last two at welterweight, against the former champion Belal Muhammad and Sean Brady. If the UFC wants to return to the UK early next year, which is their usual slot for going to England, this could be a matchup that blooms then.<\/p>\n
For now, MVP is focused on delivering a finish on August 17, on the main card of UFC 319, where the Middleweight title fight between Dricus du Plessis and Khamzat Chimaev will go down.<\/p>\n
The goal is I always go in there wanting a knockout. We need a vintage MVP knockout. <\/p>\n
– MVP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael ‘Venom’ Page will face Jared Cannonier at Middleweight at UFC 319, a matchup that, to some fans,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":45813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,785,85],"class_list":["post-45812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45812","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=45812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}