Earlier this Tuesday afternoon, footage emerged detailing a tense back-and-forth verbal altercation between incoming UFC 279 headliner, Khamzat Chimaev and recent victor, Paulo Costa at the UFC Performance Institute – with the duo corralled by their respective teams. And according to Costa, Chimaev “froze” when confronted by him.
Costa, the current #6 ranked middleweight contender, co-headlined UFC 278 back in August against former middleweight champion, Luke Rockhold – securing an impressive unanimous decision win.
As for Chimaev, the 11-0 #3 ranked contender is scheduled to take main event honors for the first time in his Octagon tenure this weekend as he meets veteran Stockton native, Nate Diaz in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Over the course of the couple-minute video, Paulo Costa is confronted by Chimaev – who questions if had previously called him out to fight, before the Chechen challenger then pokes fun at Costa’s knockout loss to champion, Israel Adesanya back in September 2020 – as well as his controversial post-fight celebration.
Paulo Costa calls for a fight with Khamzat Chimaev following UFC 279 on Saturday
Sharing his thoughts on the rather leftfield confrontation and exchange, Costa claimed that Chimaev was just a “gourmet Chechen”, explaining how the undefeated berserker “froze” when confronted.
“I met (Khamzat) Chimaev there (UFC Performance Institute), and man, he was scared,” Paulo Costa said of his interaction on his official YouTube channel. “The guy stood there and he froze. He froze. I actually was not surprised. As I said before, cupcake Chechen, gourmet Chechen is a bully with small guys.”
“He called me to talk and I went there, I faced him,” Paulo Costa revealed. “He said, ‘Hey Borrachinha, why do you talke about me?’ I said, ‘Man, what did I talk about you? You want to fight me?’ He said, ‘No, no – I want to know what you talk about me.’ I said, ‘Man, I want to fight you. I you beat Nate Diaz, I want to fight you,’ and he froze. He said, ‘Ok, so let’s fight now.’ His whole team got in the middle between me and him. Man, this guy is scared. He’s scared as f*ck. Just so you know, Chimaev, I don’t need to have a couple of guys with me. I’m an army of one man. I walk alone and I can beat you alone with just one hand.” (Transcribed by MMA Junkie)
While Costa appears to welcome a future showdown with Chimaev, the Belo Horizonte native also called out former middleweight champion, Robert Whittaker following the latter’s impressive unanimous decision win over common-foe, Marvin Vettori at UFC Paris over the weekend.