Sara McMann has revealed that she’d like to fight Miesha Tate next, and it seems that the feeling might be mutual.
Tate earned a unanimous decision victory over the previously undefeated Rin Nakai at UFC Fight Night 52 in Japan this past weekend and after watching her performance former Olympic wrestling silver medalist McMann took to twitter to call her out.
“Hey @ufc, I’d like to fight @MieshaTate since she just beat an undefeated fighter Rin Nakai,” McMann wrote.
“Any time any place pretty lady!” Tate replied, while the UFC retweeted both their messages.
In all fairness it looked like a fight that was destined to happen sooner or later anyway given that Tate is currently ranked No.2 in the official UFC woman’s bantamweight, while McMann is just one place behind her at No.3.
McMann squeezed past former Invicta FC champion Lauren Murphy by split decision last month and prior to that suffered the only loss in her nine fight MMA career when Ronda Rousey TKO’d her after just 66 seconds with a knee to the body.
Losing to Rousey is something she has in common with Tate who’s also came up short on two occasions now against the dominant champion at 135lbs. It leaves both ladies in a somewhat awkward position, unlikely to be called up for another title shot any time soon despite being two of the top contenders.
Current No.1 contender Cat Zingano looks the best bet to earn a title shot next if she wins her comeback fight against Amanda Nunes at UFC 178 this weekend, but if she loses then it would throw the cat amongst the pigeons.
Talk of signing Gina Carano seems to have called off again, while recent signing Holly Holm is looking to get a few fights in the Octagon first before facing the champion. Bethe Correiawho’s defeated two of Rousey’s ‘Four Horsewomen’ teammates has definitely caught the champion’s attention so it’s possible the UFC will look to fast-track her to the top of the division if required, while they also have the possibility of dropping their ‘hard to get’ act and signing up Cris ‘Cyborg’ if they start to struggle for meaningful opponents for the face of woman’s MMA.
Anything can happen in the UFC, so a big win for either McMann or Tate at least keeps them “in the mix”, and if someone else somehow manages to find a way to defeat Rousey or she decides to hang up her gloves and pursue her Hollywood career then they could suddenly find themselves at the head of the queue to compete for the belt, so there’s still a lot to fight for.
