A matchup between Cris “Cyborg” Justino and Holly Holm is still being negotiated after Justino said Tuesday she had cancelled a meeting with the UFC for financial reasons.
“Emotions can run high during negotiations, but to clarify things, the UFC has not made an offer for a fight at UFC 219,” Justino’s manager, George Prajin, told Brett Okamoto of ESPN.com on Wednesday. “We are still in talks. Cris wants to fight Holly Holm on Dec. 30. That is what we are working towards, and we are optimistic it will happen.”
That comes a day after Justino tweeted the following:
According to Okamoto, a meeting between Justino’s and Holm’s camps is “tentatively” scheduled for next week.
Justino, 32, is a perfect 3-0 in the UFC and 18-1-1 overall in her professional fighting career. In her last bout at UFC 214 in July, she defeated Tonya Evinger by technical knockout and claimed the vacant featherweight title. She is one of the most feared fighters of all time, and perhaps only Ronda Rousey in her prime was more dominant.
Holm, 35, is most famous for upsetting Rousey at UFC 193 in November 2015 in one of the most shocking results in the organization’s history. That win ended Rousey’s perfect 12-0 record and halted her dominance over the women’s bantamweight division. Holm promptly lost her next three fights, though she defeated Bethe Correia via TKO in June at UFC Fight Night, improving her MMA record to 11-3.
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