A lot of fans wanted to see Ilia Topuria take on the current pound-for-pound number one.
The next steps at the top of the lightweight division depended on the results of UFC 315 in Montreal this past weekend.
With Jack Della Maddalena defeating Belal Muhammad to win the welterweight title, it freed 155-pound champion Islam Makhachev up to move divisions now that his friend isn’t the titleholder.
Topuria will face Charles Oliveira for the vacant title but clearly, ‘El Matador’ isn’t ready to let Makhachev pass him by without making any further comments.
The two former champions have been going back and forth with several statements after Topuria spoke about the Oliveira matchup at a press conference.
Ilia Topuria calls Islam Makhachev a ‘coward’ in response to the former lightweight champion’s scathing message
Following Ilia Topuria’s comments at a recent press conference, Islam Makhachev hit back at ‘El Matador’ with a scathing response on social media.
Unsurprisingly, the former featherweight champion has now fired back at the UFC’s current pound-for-pound number one with a social media statement of his own.
Makhachev had claimed that though both men vacated their belts to move up a division, they are not the same because the Russian beat the top contenders first.
He called Topuria a “nobody” at lightweight after the undefeated star “ran away” from the top featherweights having only defended his belt once.
The response from the man who will fight for Makhachev’s vacant belt on June 28 didn’t go into specifics, he simply accused the 33-year-old of running away from him.
This won’t be the first time that Topuria refers to the former champion as a “coward” in what has quickly turned from a dream matchup into a rivalry.
The final part of Topuria’s message, when loosely translated from Russian to English, reads, “You’re a little boy.”
“The difference between you and me is that I am a man and you are a coward. I speak and fight. you talk and hide. Run away far, leaving no trace. Ты маленький пацан.”
Ilia Topuria certainly knows how to sell fights
Ilia Topuria has been a somewhat divisive character since he arrived in the UFC because he’s certainly not short on self-confidence.
Khamzat Chimaev spoke about this when reflecting on his first impressions of Topuria from many years back, stating that he’s a “decent, solid guy,” despite what people think.
With Islam Makhachev moving up to welterweight, we’re not going to get the clash with ‘El Matador’ just yet but that doesn’t mean that it can’t happen in the future.
Topuria’s comments during his press conference will only make that matchup even bigger once it does finally take place.