Photo by Steve Marcus/Getty Images
“I lost all respect for Cejudo. He doesn’t want to defend his belt against a real number one contender.”
Surging bantamweight Petr Yan was hoping his highlight reel knockout of Urijah Faber at UFC 245 would catapult him into title contention, but divisional champ Henry Cejudo has other plans.
‘Triple C’ seems more interested in defending his bantamweight title against Jose Aldo despite ‘Scarface’ losing to Marlon Moraes in his 135-pound debut earlier this month.
Yan, who is on a nine-fight win streak and ranked #3 in the official UFC bantamweight rankings, blasted Cejudo for cherry picking opponents.
The Russian says he lost all respect for Cejudo since ‘The Messenger’ started his campaign for the Aldo fight after UFC 245.
“I lost all respect for Cejudo,” Yan told BJPenn.com in a recent interview. “He doesn’t want to defend his belt against a real number one contender. He wants to fight someone with zero wins in the 135 division and on a two-fight losing streak, and far from the peak of his career. UFC shouldn’t support this behaviour if they want to keep any significance to that belt. Honestly, it will be bad for the sport. He is a triple clown who is trying to turn our sport into a circus.” (Transcribed by MMA Mania)
Despite being active on social media and calling out everyone from Jose Aldo to Weili Zhang, Cejudo is currently injured and expected to be out of action for the foreseeable future. The pound-for-pound #3 was recently stripped of the flyweight title for inactivity, but the 32-year-old claims he gave up the belt voluntarily.