Strikeforce heavyweight Antonio ‘Bigfoot’ Silva (16-2) is set to face Olympic Wrestler Daniel Cormier this Saturday, September 10, in the semi-finals of the World Grand Prix Heavyweight tournament.
Silva had been set to face Alistair Overeem till he was pulled from the tournament and replaced by Cormier, leaving ‘Bigfoot’ to change his game plan mid-camp from fighting a striker to fighting a wrestler.
Despite all of this, Silva feels that he’ll make it to the finals and is hoping that he’ll be standing in the cage across from Josh Barnett.
What do you guess it’ll happen on the other semifinals, between Barnett and Kharitonov?
It won’t be an easy fight for Josh. Kharitonov has pretty heavy hands and he’s much experienced, just like Josh is. He’s really experience, he’s been fighting since Pride. He really want to win this, and people could tell it when he fought Arlovski and he put on a great show, but I’m cheering for Josh. I guess he’ll win, he’s much more complete. He’s an athlete who plays well all kinds of games. He’s like a chamaleon, he’s good anywhere the fight goes.
Differently of him, I’m cheering for him. Unlike him, because he’s a guy who wants Cormier to win. Also, I read an interview on which he said he’s fighting Cormier on the finals. Unlike him, I want him to win. First because he’s a better fighter, and second I want to fight him on the finale. I guess he doesn’t want to fight me. He must be crossing his fingers so that Daniel Cormier beats me, but I won’t make it easy on him.
Josh gave an interview on which he claimed your only advantage is your size. What do you think of that?
That’s funny, each one is better in one area. Dos Santos’ advantage is his hands, which are heavy. Nogueira’s advantage is his ground game, which is pretty sharp. Each one is good in one area. He said my advantage is my size, so let it be. Let’s go there and show him sometimes size ain’t just gonna do it.
Check out the full interview at Tatame.com