Movsar Evloev doesn\u2019t blame the UFC for passing him over for a title shot after he was forced to drop out of a scheduled fight in 2025, but he\u2019s obviously hoping to get that opportunity with a win over Lerone Murphy at UFC London on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately even with both fighters in this main event sporting undefeated records, and a combined 18-fight winning streak in the UFC, neither has been promised anything by the promotion. Murphy previously disclosed that the UFC didn\u2019t guarantee him a title shot with a win and Evloev said much the same, although he obviously believes that opportunity is warranted given the stakes in this matchup.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo [title shot guaranteed], nothing like that,\u201d Evloev told MMA Fighting. \u201cIt looks like it\u2019s a [No. 1] contender fight. If I win or Murphy wins, I don\u2019t see no excuse to not give a title shot the winner of this fight.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho else? [Jean] Silva is talking after his fight, but he just lost, and he had one win and then he needs the title? He can wait his turn or get another victory to show us he deserves it or wait until I get the title and I\u2019m ready to fight this guy also.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now to be totally fair, UFC officials including Dana White have promoted plenty of fights as a No. 1 contender\u2019s matchup where the winner is supposed to get a title shot and it never happens. Bad timing, injuries or less than enthusiastic results have often changed the UFC\u2019s plans and so even if Evloev or Murphy were told a title shot was next, it doesn\u2019t necessarily guarantee it.<\/p>\n
That said, reigning UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski already pushed for Evloev to get a title shot in the past, and he did the same thing after defending his belt against Diego Lopes in February. Volkanovski made it clear he wants to face the toughest challenges possible, and the winner of Evloev vs. Murphy definitely qualifies.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook, that\u2019s how real champions talk,\u201d Evloev said about Volkanovski. \u201cI was waiting for him, nothing [disrespectful] but this guy is a real man. He\u2019s fighting with the best and that\u2019s why he became the best featherweight of all-time.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe deserves this, and I can\u2019t wait to fight with him after Murphy. I have in my list a name like him.\u201d<\/p>\n
While he obviously jumped at the chance to face Murphy at UFC London, Evloev actually felt like his upcoming opponent already did enough to deserve his own title shot after scoring a brutal knockout over Aaron Pico last year.<\/p>\n
That was originally Evloev\u2019s fight but Murphy replaced him and he certainly made the most of the opportunity. But the UFC ultimately decided to give Diego Lopes the title fight instead so now Murphy is facing Evloev on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo be honest, I was shocked when they gave Lopes the title shot instead of him,\u201d Evloev said. \u201cBecause when he take the fight for short notice after I didn\u2019t fight him, he won with a good knockout. A spinning elbow and in my head he\u2019s supposed to fight for the title but for some reason UFC didn\u2019t give him [the title shot].<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe he doesn\u2019t have enough good fighters who he\u2019s beat and me and him, two undefeated guys who need the title and it\u2019s just one title. We\u2019ll fight each other to see who deserves more.\u201d<\/p>\n
When it comes to this matchup, Evloev is very confident that he\u2019ll vanquish Murphy and then earn his long-awaited title shot.<\/p>\n
As impressive as Murphy has been during his winning streak, Evloev hasn\u2019t been overly blown away by his performances \u2014 even the jaw-dropping knockout he delivered against Pico.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven his last win it was by a mistake of his opponent,\u201d Evloev said. \u201cPico was pretty good until this elbow. He just got knocked out, because he started playing too much. He didn\u2019t give him enough respect and that\u2019s why he paid a big price.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I\u2019m not going to underestimate this guy. He\u2019s strong, good [wrestling defense], pretty good skills of striking. But the pressure will work against him, especially my pressure. He\u2019s not going to stop me. Like he said, he\u2019s going to push me, he\u2019s going to win by pressure. We\u2019ll see who has more pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Movsar Evloev doesn\u2019t blame the UFC for passing him over for a title shot after he was forced…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":548515,"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-548514","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\/548514","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=548514"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548514\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/548515"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=548514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=548514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=548514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}