Volkanovski is getting in shape for his next fight, be it in Australia or Spain. But one thing he made clear: he’s heard nothing from UFC about fighting Lopes for an interim title.
Alexander Volkanovski is training hard for whatever comes next, be it Spain or Australia.
The former UFC featherweight champion is waiting on word from the UFC as to when his next fight happens, and where. As for against whom? Rumors have been flying that Volkanovski could be fighting Diego Lopes for an interim title in Sydney for UFC 312 in February.
According to Volk, there’s been absolutely zero discussions with the UFC of that happening.
“The Lopes thing, I don’t know where that came from,” he said in a new video on his YouTube channel. “He obviously said ‘Let’s do it in Sydney,’ and I think people just ran with that. But there’s no talks of that at all.”
“You never know, right? But yeah, obviously we’re fighting for the title so that’s where we’re gonna mainly focus, but we’ll see what happens. But there’s definitely nothing like that locked in.”
For now Volkanovski is just getting back to fighting fitness after several months of taking it easy. The goal is to ensure he’s 100% ready to go just in case the call comes for him to fight on February 9th down under.
“We’re getting stuck in the training,” he said. “We don’t know exactly what’s going on just yet. Obviously, we’re fighting for the title. When is that gonna be? That’s sort of the question. Let’s see if we can get a stadium in Spain, obviously that’s an option. Could Sydney still be an option? If so, I’ll stay fit.”
“I’ll be getting close to camp now anyway if we do make Sydney,” he concluded. “So I’ll just get stuck into it, stuck into training and we’ll see what happens. Nothing locked in yet, but we’ll see.”
What happens next depends on the UFC’s ability to secure a venue in Spain for featherweight champion Ilia Topuria to defend his belt. Sources report to MMAMania.com that the promotion is currently working on that piece of the puzzle, with UFC CEO Dana White saying he’d begrudgingly use a stadium rather than an arena if he has to in order to get “El Matador” a big homecoming fight.
But with no big fight to top UFC 312 yet and Israel Adesanya reportedly headed to Saudi Arabia, the UFC may be looking to “The Great” to fill the top spot in Sydney, especially if the Topuria show doesn’t come together until summer.