‘UFC World Champion’

Cocky … or confident?

Ilia Topuria has already crowned himself “UFC World Champion” on social media, despite the fact that “El Matador” is still roughly two months away from challenging reigning featherweight champion Alex Volkanovski in the UFC 298 pay-per-view (PPV) main event, recently made official for Sat., Feb. 17, 2024 at Honda Center in Anaheim, California.

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Reminder: Ilia Topuria’s biggest fan is … Ilia Topuria.

Volkanovski (26-3) is coming off a shocking, first-round knockout loss to Islam Makhachev at UFC 294 last October, a short-notice rematch that marked the Aussie’s second (unsuccessful) attempt to join the coveted “champ-champ” club. With those aspirations behind him, Volkanovski will get back to work in his own weight class.

Perhaps a little too quickly, based on this opinion.

Topuria (14-0) kept his undefeated streak intact by knocking around featherweight bruiser Josh Emmett at UFC on ABC 5 last June. “El Matador” was able to leapfrog the rest of the Top 5 because Volkanovski and longtime rival, Max Holloway, have done a pretty good job of shutting down most of the eligible contenders.

“He needs to do something in February to show elite level because right now, I haven’t seen it,” Volkanovski told The MMA Hour (transcribed by MMA News). “That doesn’t mean he’s not elite… But, there’s gonna be levels where you need to be more than just fundamentally sound. Like, if he thinks he’s gonna be able to outwrestle me, with what I’ve seen, he needs to show more than what he’s done, a lot more. Submission-wise, a lot more.”

“I haven’t seen him do anything more special than any other of the guys that I’ve faced,” Volkanovski continued. “That doesn’t mean he’s not that good, but he needs to show me that. With the striking, again, durable, powerful dude, very fundamentally sound… But again, it’s so much more than that. I’ll leave it at that.”

To see who else is fighting at UFC 298 click here.