An undated photo of UFC legend Khabib Nurmagomedov. — Instagram/khabib_nurmagomedov
Daniel Cormier on Wednesday responded to Khabib Nurmagomedov’s views on a potential fight between lightweight champion Ilia Topuria and Arman Tsarukyan.
Topuria has become one of the biggest stars in all of mixed martial arts today following his knockout victory against Charles Oliveira in June to capture the lightweight belt.
The lightweight champion, who remained undefeated and extended his professional record to 17-0, moved up from featherweight after a dominant run that included wins over top contenders like Josh Emmett and Bryce Mitchell.
With the win, Topuria has also joined the elite group of fighters who have won UFC titles in two different divisions.
Meanwhile, Tsarukyan is the top-ranked contender for a title shot against ‘El Matador’ and is on a four-fight winning streak in the UFC.
Khabib, in a recent interview, predicted Arman as the clear winner against Topuria, saying: “I’d say it’s 80%-20% in Arman’s favor.”
In a recent video on his YouTube channel, Cormier shared his view on Topuria vs Sarukyan, which clashed with Khabib Nurmagomedov’s statement.
“80-20 is crazy though, come on man. 80-20 is hard when anyone’s fighting… I don’t believe that for one second,” Cormier said.
“I really do disagree with Khabib on that one. There’s not a guy in the world that I believe is going to beat Ilia Topuria 8 out of 10 times. That’s just the truth.”
Khabib has a UFC record of 29-0 and is widely accepted as the greatest of all time in MMA.
In a recent interview, Arman mentioned that Khabib is his idol and how the legend inspired him when he was starting the sport.
“I got a lot of favorite fighters. I always watch their fights to see how they move, how they wrestle,” Sarukyan said.
“But if we say who inspired me when I was young, it was Khabib [Nurmagomedov]. Because he’s from Russia and I’m from Russia as well. I live there, and like when I started training MMA, he was a goal for us.”