Tom Aspinall is officially done waiting for the return of UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones and has started training for two specific opponents next.
A few weeks ago during a storm on X (formerly Twitter), UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones appeared to confirm his retirement from the sport amid his continuous saga with Tom Aspinall.
However, despite Jon Jones’ meltdown on X, UFC boss Dana White confirmed at the UFC 316 post-fight press conference that Jones did previously accept a fight against Aspinall and wasn’t aware of his activity on social media.
Not long after, the UFC interim heavyweight champion claimed Jones has reached his time limit and will soon be stripped of his title, making the Brit the undisputed champion.
Aspinall reveals the two heavyweights he is now training to fight
Although Aspinall has continued to stay in training throughout the entire heavyweight title saga, he hasn’t been able to train for a specific opponent.
However, with him now having given up on waiting for ‘Bones’, the Brit has revealed which two heavyweight contenders he has started training specifically for.
“I’m training for (Alexander) Volkov and (Jailton) Almeida this week,” Aspinall said in the comment section of a post on Instagram.
In 2022, Aspinall headlined in the UFC for the first time when the promotion returned to London. The hometown favorite took on Alexander Volkov and utterly dominated the Russian and finished him in the first round.
Since then, Volkov has picked up four wins and just one loss, however, his loss to Ciryl Gane last December was highly controversial, and even Dana White apologized to him for getting ‘robbed’.
Jailton Almeida on the other hand was once considered as an almost guaranteed future champion in the UFC. Despite that, a loss to Curtis Blaydes last year momentarily halted his momentum.
The Brazilian managed to bounce back from the loss with back-to-back first round finishes, once again putting himself into title contention.
Almeida responds to Aspinall’s training declaration
Following the interim champions training declaration, ‘Malhadinho’ issued a response to Aspinall, calling for Dana White and co to book the fight.
“Tom Aspinall, be sure I’m ready to fight you! SEND THE UFC CONTRACT. Glad the champ is saying my name, I’m ready to go,” Almeida said.
Despite Almeida’s hopefulness that he will fight for the title, it is unclear which direction the UFC will go in and whether they will continue to hold out hope that Jones will return.