{"id":551712,"date":"2026-03-21T18:26:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-21T18:26:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/551712\/"},"modified":"2026-03-21T18:26:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-21T18:26:08","slug":"alexander-volkanovski-wants-movsar-evloev-next-to-debunk-dagestani-wrestling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/551712\/","title":{"rendered":"Alexander Volkanovski Wants Movsar Evloev Next To Debunk Dagestani Wrestling"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reigning UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski will be watching closely later tonight (Sat., Mar. 21, 2026) as Movsar Evloev headlines UFC London<\/a> against fellow contender Lerone Murphy in hopes that the Russian wrestler can pull out his 10th-straight Octagon win.<\/p>\n

Volkanovski, who is coming off his second-straight win over Diego Lopes at UFC 325 this past February, is looking to stay active in 2026. This includes three potential trips to the Octagon<\/a> as the 37-year-old veteran staves off talks of his UFC retirement<\/a>. Volkanovski is expected to get the winner of tonight\u2019s Evloev vs. Murphy matchup so he\u2019ll surely be tuning in for UFC London\u2019s main event.<\/p>\n

If it was up to Volkanovski he would get his hands on Evloev next. In fact, the featherweight legend lobbied for his last title defense to come against Evloev<\/a>, but UFC matchmakers wanted Volkanovski to prove himself against Lopes one more time. Volkanovski is hoping that Evloev can snap Murphy\u2019s 10-fight UFC unbeaten streak so the two can finally do battle and he can prove that he has \u201cthe answer to that Dagestani and Chechen wrestling.\u201d<\/p>\n

Remember, Volkanovski lost twice to pound-for-pound king and current UFC welterweight champion, Islam Makhachev, but some believe \u201cThe Great\u201d actually won their first fight<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201dThis has been a problem for fighters,\u201d said Volkanovski via his YouTube channel<\/a>. \u201cA lot of fighters don\u2019t know how to deal with this. You\u2019ve got [Khamzat] Chimaev just out grappling, Islam wrestling, all these guys that have been so effective with their Dagestani wrestling, the Chechen wrestling, and a lot of people can\u2019t figure it out.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve seen in my fight with Islam that I can deal with it, and I\u2019d love to get a guy who, if he wins against Lerone, he\u2019s gonna be 20-0. I\u2019d prefer Movsar just because of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

For complete UFC London results, coverage, and highlights click HERE<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Reigning UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski will be watching closely later tonight (Sat., Mar. 21, 2026) as Movsar…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":551713,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,33601,638,82,139445,702],"class_list":["post-551712","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-latest-ufc-mma-news","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc-on-paramount","tag-ufc-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551712","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=551712"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551712\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/551713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=551712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=551712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=551712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}