Giga Chikadze took a tough loss over the weekend against Calvin Kattar. The fight, which headlined UFC Vegas 46, ended in a unanimous decision loss for the Georgian. Though, he did secure a Fight of the Night bonus.
The exciting bout snapped a nine-fight winning streak for Chikadze and pushed him down the queue as potential UFC featherweight title challengers. The man who both Chikadze and Kattar are chasing, Alexander Volkanovski, was on The MMA Hour yesterday. On that show he took issue with some of the things that Chikadze had said before the fight.
Specifically, Volkanovski derided Chikadze for suggesting he took “easy” fights. This comment came after Chang Sung Jung was slotted into a title fight with Volkanovski after Max Holloway was forced to withdraw due to an injury.
“Look at the people I’ve fought. Look at the guy’s I’ve fought. Mate, you’re an absolute idiot if you think that I have dodged fights,” Volkanovski said (ht MMA Fighting). “Max Holloway has proved he’s the next-best guy. I’m giving him the trilogy after winning twice. Who does that? Only guys that know that they’ve got the skills to keep winning are going to do that. The guys that don’t give a fuck. The guys that have balls and are going to do what they need to do.
“That’s just plain and simple. I’m an easy champ to understand. I ain’t running from nobody. Earn that No. 1 spot and you can get it.”
Volkanovski also said that he thought the loss to Kattar would serve as a “big eye-opener” for Chikadze.
“That, mate, [against] good guys, you can’t just rely on a kick. You know, the Giga kick. It just shows you, you nullify his Giga kick and he ends up being a punching bag. Again just, man, that’s why you’ve got to fight these contenders. Fight all the top guys, guys that are going to mix it up. See where you are before you start facing the champ. You could imagine when you talk about making adjustments, game planning, cardio, all these tools that I have — mate, I would have made him look really, really bad. You could imagine.
“So before you want to take out these types of guys, let’s experiment with some of these good guys and see where you’re at. And he showed that he’s not really at that level.”
Volkanovski, who is undefeated in the UFC, is scheduled to face ‘The Korean Zombie’ in the main event of UFC 273 on April 9. That card is also due to host a UFC bantamweight title reunification bout between Aljamain Sterling and Petr Yan.
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