ESPN<\/a>, Chimaev discussed a possible fight with Imavov, and a slight reluctance to it due to being friendly, and also the possible political ramifications.<\/p>\n\u201cHe\u2019s a good guy,\u201d Chimaev said. \u201cI know him, he knows me, we know each other. If you ask me, I don\u2019t want to fight this guy, because we know each other. Like [he\u2019s] a Muslim. He\u2019s from Dagestan. You know how Dagestan [and] Chechen people are like, it\u2019s a little bit like a lot of drama on the internet, and all this [stuff] I don\u2019t like about it.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut if UFC wants it, I\u2019m never going to say no. If the guy wants it \u2013 I tell his manager as well: \u2018Brother, if Nassourdine wants, I\u2019m going to be open.\u2019 If he says he can wait until I move up, that would be great. But I\u2019m not going to say, \u2018No, I don\u2019t want to fight this guy.\u2019 For me it doesn\u2019t matter.\u201d<\/p>\n
Imavov was asked to respond to Chimaev\u2019s comments, and says he feels the same way the champion does.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course, I heard what Khamzat said and I 100 percent agree with him,\u201d Imavov said. \u201cWe are in the same position, we know each other, and everything. But like he said, if the UFC want to put this fight [together], they will go in and they will go full inside the cage, and that\u2019s it.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo I saw a lot of comments and everything on Twitter about [me] and Khamazt not willing to fight [against] each other and everything. No, that\u2019s not the truth. The only thing is that right now it\u2019s for the belt, so it\u2019s for the belt. It\u2019s in the hands of the UFC, and UFC puts the fight they want for the belt. And if they call Nassourdine to fight Khamzat, or Khamzat to fight Nassourdine, that\u2019s the same, but both [of us] will say yes, and we will go full at it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The title picture at 185 pounds isn\u2019t as clear today as it was following Imavov\u2019s dominant decision win over Caio Borralho in the main event of UFC Paris this past September. This past Saturday, Sean Strickland finished Anthony Hernandez in the third round of the UFC Houston main event, and considering the UFC\u2019s modern business model, there\u2019s a lot of chatter about Strickland possibly leapfrogging Imavov.<\/p>\n
The other hurdle in regards to a Chimaev vs. Imavov matchup is Chimaev saying he wants to move up to the light heavyweight division, targeting current champion Alex Pereira for a superfight. UFC CEO recently said he\u2019d like to see Chimaev defend his title once before considering making a move up to another division.<\/p>\n
Imavov isn\u2019t surprised Chimaev wants to make the move up to the 205-pound division.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know him, he\u2019s really heavy for the middleweight division and that\u2019s why he wants to go up to 205,\u201d Imavov explained. \u201cNow Dana said he doesn\u2019t want someone to go up without defending. So if Dana says it, it\u2019s like this. And that\u2019s the UFC who manages everything at the end.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut if we speak about Khamzat going up, like we saw some exceptions in the past and everything, and Khamzat is, maybe, a big enough star to go up without defending, but it doesn\u2019t matter in the end. It will be the choice of the UFC. And me? I\u2019m ready for whatever.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While Nassourdine Imavov wonders if he\u2019ll still get the next UFC middleweight title shot, the top contender says…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":505756,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,1347,785,85,787,1396,14855],"class_list":["post-505755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-latest-news","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc","tag-ufc-news","tag-videos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505755","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=505755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/505755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/505756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=505755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=505755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=505755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}