Fedor Emelianenko Hospitalized With COVID-19

One of the pioneers of MMA, Fedor Emelianenko has been hospitalized after testing positive with Covid-19. According to RT Sport, Fedor posted the following on Thursday:

“Thanks to all who are genuinely concerned for my health, I feel fine. I am going into recovery. I’m grateful to the doctors and medical staff for their care and hard work” (H/T MMA Junkie).

RT Sport also reported that Emelianenko is currently in a specialist Covid-19 hospital, situated in Moscow. The Heavyweight legend was supposedly set to headline Bellators first ever even in Russia had Covid not struck. According to Scott Coker the event would have served as Fedor’s retirement bout. In an interview with MMA Junkie, Coker stated the following:

“I really wanted Fedor to fight his retirement fight not in front of just the officials and have the staff and be on a closed environment in a bubble. I really want Fedor to finish his career in front of 30,000 people in Moscow, to be honest, Bellator MMA’s first fight in Russia.”

“Do a fight in Moscow. For him, the prodigal son has returned. Fedor is the greatest fighter of all-time, and he’s now coming home to retire and put his gloves up and hang it up to retire.”

In the same interview, Coker also said that he still hoped to hold the event, once Covid had been contained.

“I’m hoping that the vaccine will start fixing the situation and we can start bringing in crowds,” Coker said. “But to me, I feel we’ve waited so long for Fedor to fight, hoping that the pandemic would thin out, and now that it’s getting close and I can see light at the end of the tunnel for the pandemic to go away, I really want to wait and to do these fights in a proper stadium, especially the one we do in Moscow.

“I want to do something very big for him, because to me, it’s like he’s the king, and the king is returning from the battlefield.”

This likely the last thing Fedor Emelianenko is currently thinking about, and there is a strong possibility that we may never see the Last Emperor grace the sport of MMA again.