Alexander Volkanovski says he is a bad match-up for newly crowned lightweight champion Islam Makhachev – and opening as an underdog suits the UFC’s pound-for-pound king just fine.
Featherweight champion Volkanovski is poised to get a shot at becoming a two-division champion when the UFC returns to Australia in February.
Featherweight champion Alex Volkanovski is closing in on a shot at the UFC lightweight title.Credit:James Worsfold/Zuffa LLC
Volkanovski was on standby for a shot at the lightweight title in Abu Dhabi last weekend, ready to step in had either Makhachev or Charles Oliveira been forced out of UFC 280’s main event.
Makhachev claimed the lightweight title with a second-round submission, before inviting “the short guy” Volkanovski into the octagon for a face-off ahead of a likely showdown in the main event of UFC 284 at Perth’s RAC Arena on February 12.
“That’s the perfect situation for me, a full camp, obviously all the promotion around me fighting for the lightweight title, rather than getting thrown in at the last minute and not really getting that promotion around it,” Volkanovski told the Herald.
“Having a main card based around you would be more ideal rather than getting chucked in late notice.
UFC lightweight champion Islam Makhachev.Credit:Getty
“It would be incredible [to fight for the title in Australia], that would be unreal. That’s why I put myself in this position, so no one could take the opportunity away from me and I can stake my claim as the next guy to fight for the title. [UFC president] Dana White has confirmed I’m the next guy in line.”
February’s event will mark the UFC’s first event in Australia since October 2019, when Israel Adesanya dethroned Rob Whittaker to claim the middleweight title in front of 57,127 people, which still stands as the promotion’s biggest crowd in history.
Volkanovski is adamant he can simultaneously hold and defend championships across two different divisions.
The 31-year-old Russian is a former Sambo world champion with an exceptional ground game likened to that of former UFC star Khabib Nurmagomedov.
Sambo is a style of amateur wrestling with Soviet origins, the name of which translates to “self defence without weapons”.
Makhachev has won 11 of his 24 MMA bouts by submission – but Volkanovski insists he is a bad match-up for Makhachev.
“I’m very hard to hold down. For Islam, he’s going to be very strong and he’s going to be very grappling heavy, but to get me down is hard enough, but then to get me flat on my back and hold me down is very, very hard,” Volkanovski said.
“My wall work defence is among the best in the UFC to be honest, so I think I’m a bad match-up in that sense.”
Whittaker is poised to face Paulo Costa in Perth as he chases another shot at middleweight champion Israel Adesanya, while light heavyweight Jimmy Crute is in line to make his return from a knee reconstruction.
“The sport is massive now globally, but even in Australia it has grown so much. We’ve got some of the best fighters in the world in Australia and New Zealand, it’s going to be incredible,” Volkanovski said.
“We’ve literally got that many good fighters, you couldn’t even put them all on the same card because it would be too stacked, it would be like the biggest card in history. That’s how many good fighters we have in this part of the world.”
