UFC lightweight star Paddy Pimblett clarified his stance towards Ilia Topuria after their recent classy back-and-forths.<\/p>\n
Paddy Pimblett will fight for the interim lightweight title next month against Justin Gaethje at UFC 324, with the winner set for a likely showdown against undisputed champ Ilia Topuria. Topuria is dealing with issues outside of fighting and is taking an indefinite hiatus from competition.<\/p>\n
Almost four years ago, Pimblett and Topuria\u2019s feud kicked off when they got into a physical altercation at a UFC fighter hotel in London. Since then, they\u2019ve traded barbs in person and online, including in a heated faceoff in the cage following UFC 317.<\/p>\n
But Topuria recently attempted to squash his long-standing beef<\/a> with Pimblett, calling him an \u2018extremely entertaining\u2019 fighter and forgiving his past transgressions. Pimblett, on the other hand, isn\u2019t willing to let things go.<\/p>\n Paddy Pimblett: Ilia Topuria and I \u2018still hate each other\u2019 despite recent support<\/p>\n In a recent interview with The Independent<\/a>, Pimblett revealed where things stand between him and Topuria after their recent back-and-forths.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n \u201cI still hate him, and I know he still hates me,\u201d Pimblett said of Topuria. \u201cWe still dislike each other, we still want to batter each other, but that\u2019s in the cage.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201dFamily is different. I\u2019d never, ever talk about someone\u2019s family, and I know he wouldn\u2019t talk about mine. He\u2019s just not that way inclined. We\u2019re not pieces of s\u2013t like Colby Covington. It\u2019s nothing to do with our families once we get in there.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe can say anything he wants about me, anything personal,\u201d Pimblett concluded. \u201cI can say anything personal about him. He can call me a blonde b\u2014h all he wants, and I can call him a little midget sausage. That\u2019s not bringing families into it, is it? So it\u2019s all good.\u201d (h\/t MMA Mania<\/a>)<\/p>\n If Pimblett is victorious at UFC 324, a matchup with Topuria is likely next. But as of this writing, it\u2019s uncertain when Topuria will return to the Octagon to defend his lightweight championship.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UFC lightweight star Paddy Pimblett clarified his stance towards Ilia Topuria after their recent classy back-and-forths. Paddy Pimblett…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":354270,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,3262,9577,638,15502,82,640,153471],"class_list":{"0":"post-354269","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-ilia-topuria","12":"tag-justin-gaethje","13":"tag-mma","14":"tag-paddy-pimblett","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-ufc","17":"tag-ufc-324"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354269","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=354269"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354269\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/354270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=354269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=354269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=354269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}