“You must respect her as a god,” Zhang Weili praises Rose Namajunas but claims she is still a target


“You must respect her as a god,” Zhang Weili praises Rose Namajunas but claims she is still a target

Zhang Weili and Rose Namajunas

The former UFC women’s strawweight champion, Zhang Weili lost her title to Rose Namajunas in the co-main event of UFC 261 by a first-round head kick knockout.

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As soon as the fight ended, Weili lost her temper and lashed out at the referee Keith Peterson for stopping the fight and she received a lot of rage on social media regarding this.

Talking about this in her latest interview with My Bronze Age, Zhang Weili says, “Everyone commented on this, Haters, supporters, giving me all kinds of comments. I felt like I was being cyber-bullied at the time.”

“I told [my coach] that I want to have an old phone, I don’t want to look at the Internet and all the comments anymore. He said you can’t, you can’t live in your own vacuum, you need to accept this.” {H/T MMA Mania}

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Weili was having a really hard time accepting this defeat and she even blamed the crowd for being so harsh to her and leading her to lose this fight after having a winning streak of more than 20 fights.

Zhang Weili shows utmost respect to Rose Namajunas

Zhang Weili
Zhang Weili

Although, Weili is still sore about losing her title to Namajunas but she still praised her for the performance at UFC 261 and even compared her to god level. She added, “You must have no feelings when you see the knockout again,”

“She’s the champion now. You must admire her. You must respect her as a god. You can’t think, ‘she got the belt because of my accidental mistake.’ Rose is at the top and I should give all due respect. She’s the champ, just like a god. She’s the one in billions. I should respect her. But she’s still my target.” {H/T MMA Mania}

Weili can probably face one more former champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk in a rematch later this year, as Namajunas is expected to face Carla Esparza for her first title defense.

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Also Read: “Deep inside, I couldn’t accept this fact,” Zhang Weili once again tries to justify her behavior at UFC 261.