“I want to fight so bad, it would be hard for me to say no to a fight,” Gilbert Burns opens about his fight offer against Khamzat Chimaev
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Gilbert Burns and Khamzat Chimaev
The UFC Welterweight fighter, Khamzat Chimaev became one of the latest prospects for the UFC Welterweight title with his win against Li Jingliang at UFC 267. With this win, he positioned himself on number 10th in the UFC Welterweight division rankings and UFC is already looking for a big name for his next fight.
It was rumored the UFC is targeting a fight between Khamzat Chimaev and number 3rd ranked UFC Welterweight fighter, Gilbert Burns for February 2022. Burns came into the win column with a unanimous decision win against Stephen Thompson at UFC 264.
Although this fight doesn’t make a sense for Burns as he is ranked much higher than Khamzat, but in his latest interview with MMA Fighting Portuguese Podcast, Gilbert Burns shares his feeling about the idea of fighting Khamzat Chimaev next, Burns says,
“I don’t think I’ll fight him while he’s ranked at No. 10, I think he’ll fight one more time and, after winning against a top-5 or top-6 welterweight, getting closer to the top 5, I’d fight him, no problem at all. Top-10, I wouldn’t fight him. But that’s me fighting against myself. Top-10 doesn’t make sense, but I want to fight, so it’s complicated.”
“I’ve asked to fight Neil Magny many times, who’s around No. 9, and the UFC didn’t want to give me this fight because of the ranking situation, so they won’t even offer me Khamzat because they just said they wouldn’t give me Neil Magny because of the rankings. But man, I want to fight so bad, it would be hard for me to say no to a fight.” {H/t MMA Fighting}
Gilbert Burns believes there are still lots of bad matches for Khamzat Chimaev in the division
Khamzat Chimaev holds an undefeated record of 10-0 and he has single-handedly dominated all his opponents inside UFC. He also finished all 10 of the opponents he faced, but Gilbert Burns still believes he hasn’t faced elite competition until now and Chimaev still has a lot of bad matches in the division.
Burns continued, “I think there are many high-level wrestlers and grapplers in the division that would complicate things for him, aside from Kamaru, who’s also a very complicated fight for him, I think myself and Colby Covington complicate things for him.”
“We haven’t seen him against a high-level striker in this division, someone like Vicente Luque and ‘Wonderboy,’ two very dangerous strikers where one hand that lands can knock you out. Judging by his wrestling, I think myself and Colby would make things very difficult for his game, and Vicente and ‘Wonderboy’ would make things hard for him on the feet.” {H/t MMA Fighting}
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Tanya Goyal
(254 Articles Published)