Amanda Nunes Wants UFC Featherweight Belt, but Won't Fight Cris Cyborg to Get It
UFC bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes still wants to fight for the featherweight title, as long as it isn't Cris Cyborg that she'd have to challenge.
After she defended her belt against Ronda Rousey at UFC 207 in December, Nunes took aim at the newly formed 145-pound division, saying she wanted to challenge the winner of the inaugural title fight between Germaine de Randamie and Holly Holm. That was before the UFC convinced her to remain at 135 pounds and defend her belt against Valentina Shevchenko, a fighter she had already defeated in a three-round bout in March of 2016.
She'll square off with Shevchenko at UFC 213 on July 8 in Las Vegas. If successful, she still wants a shot at the featherweight belt.
“I'm interested in fighting the girl who holds the belt now, de Randamie, because I already beat her. If UFC wanna give me opportunity to go up now, yes, I would take it. But later is another thing,” Nunes said during a Wednesday promotional luncheon in Los Angeles.
Another thing means specifically that she doesn't want to fight Cyborg.
“I wanna see Cyborg with the belt. I'm not interested in fighting her,” Nunes said before further explaining why she wouldn't fight Cyborg.
“Because I have to do a lot of things to fight Cyborg. Cyborg is way heavier than me; way bigger than me. I have to change all my training style to fight Cyborg. This is a lot of things I have to go over with my coach.”
The UFC recently announced the formation of the women's flyweight division (125 pounds). The upcoming season of The Ultimate Fighter, which will air during the fall/winter season, will crown the division's first champion. That is another option for Nunes, who was adamant that she would do something different following the Shevchenko fight, believing that she has already cleaned out her division.
“After my fight, I could go down as well. After this fight, many things can happen because I clean out the division already,” she stated. “I beat all the tops in the division before I got the belt. After the next fight, I'm gonna do something else.”
But that something else will not include fighting Cris Cyborg.
