Amanda Nunes Reveals Why She’s Fighting Raquel Pennington Instead Of Cris Cyborg
A fight between UFC women’s featherweight champion Cris Cyborg and UFC women’s bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes has been postponed.
In the past, Cyborg has explained her position on the possible fight with Nunes. As for the main reason, it’s due to her not wanting to fight a fellow Brazilian.
Even though this would be the most difficult task of her career, Nunes can’t wait to fight the featherweight champion not because it’s personal but rather because she wants to broke Cyborg’s 20-fight unbeaten streak.
However, this fight will have to wait. The UFC has already announced that the women’s bantamweight champion would make her next title defense against rising contender Raquel Pennington at the upcoming UFC 224 pay-per-view event.
Nunes recently appeared on the UFC Unfiltered podcast (transcript courtesy of MMA Fighting) to talk about her next title defense as well as why she took this fight instead of the super fight with Cyborg.
“When I texted Dana White that I wanted the fight, I didn’t have nobody in my division,” said Nunes. “I didn’t even know if I was gonna fight soon. I was concerned with waiting years because I’ve been in that position before, waiting so long for a fight, I don’t want to do it again and stay waiting, waiting, waiting.
“But now, we have Rocky [Pennington] and we have the Brazilian, Ketlen [Vieira] and I feel like my division is starting to grow. If you pay attention, the division’s gonna be awesome and now I have two. I have Rocky and I have Ketlen. Rocky is my next step and I want to see Ketlen after, for sure.”
“I think she’s deserving, after this fight against Rocky,” said Nunes. “She beat the girl that beat me. I think she’s ready and I’m excited to fight her.”
The UFC 224 pay-per-view event is slated to go down on Saturday, May 12 in Rio de Janeiro. The main card will air on pay-per-view at 10 p.m. ET while the preliminary card will air on FOX Sports 1 at 8 p.m. ET and the promotion’s streaming service, UFC Fight Pass.
Cyborg has fought as recently as this month. As seen in the main event of the UFC 222 event on pay-per-view at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, Cyborg successfully retained her title against newcomer Yana Kunitskaya by picking up a TKO win in the first round.
“There’s gonna be a lot of things involved in that,” said the champion. “Having the contract for her, for me, it has to make sense for both of us so we can do this. It’s nothing personal against Cyborg. When you become a professional fighter, you want to become the best, you want to beat the best.
“It’s nothing personal but I feel like there’s a lot of things involved in that and I don’t want to wait for that. I want to keep fighting, I don’t want to wait to negotiate. Right now my division has a new contender and I’m excited for that. Whatever happens after that, we’ll see.”
