If bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes’ coach Din Thomas is to be believed then she isn’t anything but intimidated at the possibility of moving up a division to fight featherweight queen Cris ‘Cyborg’ Justino.
In fact, according to Thomas, Nunes was actively cheering on ‘Cyborg’ against Holly Holm in the hopes that it would set up a potential ‘superfight’ between the two champions in 2018.
“For the longest time, everybody’s been saying that Amanda didn’t want to fight Cyborg,” Thomas told Tyron Woodley on his ‘Morning Wood’ podcast. “I don’t really know how that rumor got started but everybody thought that, but I was hanging out with Amanda two weeks ago and I was at her crib and she was like, ‘Hey, I want to fight Cyborg. I hope she wins.’
“It wasn’t on no beef, she was just like, ‘I want to fight whoever wins.’ I was like, ‘You want to fight Cyborg?’ and she said, ‘Yeah I want to fight Cyborg. I don’t see what the threat is.’ That’s what she was telling me.
“For her to want that fight, I was like, hell yeah, let’s get this fight. She doesn’t see the threat that everybody thought was there for her. She doesn’t see it and I love that about Amanda when it comes to this fight. I think she presents way more problems than people think that she can give Cyborg.”
So, the ball appears to be in ‘Cyborg’s’ court as to whether this fight will happen or not, and as things stand it seems she’s the one who appears to be reluctant to take on the challenge, having indicated on more than one occasion now that she wants to fight a genuine 145lb’er rather than Nunes.
