Merab Dvalishvili has been unstoppable during his rise to become the UFC’s bantamweight champion over the past six year, but Cory Sandhagen has predicted that’s about to change when ‘The Machine’ goes up against Umar Nurmagomedov in the main event of UFC 311 next month.
The No.4 ranked Sandhagen has first-hand knowledge of how good Nurmagomedov is, having lost to him by unanimous decision in a title eliminator back in August, and as such he believes that the current champion will find the going tough regardless of where the fight takes place.
“I think that Umar probably will win,” Sandhagen told MiddleEasy. “I just can’t really see a path for Merab to win. I don’t think that he’s going to be able to strike with him, but I also don’t think that he’ll be able to take him down and control him like he was able to do against O’Malley and against other guys. I just don’t really see a path to success for Merab. I think Umar is likely going to defend a lot of those shots, keep it in the striking realm, and just kind of – Umar’s a sniper, man.
“People don’t really realize just how fast that guy is and how good he is and how his kicks come out of nowhere. Fighting a guy like Merab will be a good opportunity for him to show off a little bit and just because Merab’s been talking a lot of sh*t, I kind of want to watch Merab get served up a little bit by a guy who is supposed to be a wrestler but wasn’t able to wrestle me, but Merab’s still saying that I was a gift and stuff. So, I’m on Team Umar now.”
Dvalishvili certainly hasn’t appeared to be overly eager to take on the undefeated 18-0 Nurmagomedov in recent months, despite him being an obvious choice following his six-fight winning start to his time in the UFC.
That being said, with his current winning streak extending to 11 fights and including victories over the likes of Sean O’Malley, Henry Cejudo, Petr Yan and Jose Aldo, Dvalishvili has already proven that he’s willing to take on the best fighters the division has to offer, and it’ll be very intriguing to see who comes out on top when this title showdown takes place on January 18th next year in Inglewood, California.
