Colby Covington is riding high after securing the next welterweight title shot against current UFC champion Leon Edwards at UFC 296 this coming December. It’s a matchup that Covington has been holding out for and another opportunity for him to hoist UFC gold by year’s end.
Fortunately for Covington, he feels ultra-confident with the matchup at hand. While Edwards is a world-class striker with exceptional takedown defense, Covington still believes the fight favors him on paper. Even though Edwards is coming off back-to-back wins over Kamaru Usman “Chaos” is confident that he’ll have the upper hand for UFC 296’s upcoming title fight.
“It’s a great matchup, I love fighting southpaws,” Covington recently told MMA reporter James Lynch. “There’s a reason he’s delaying this matchup, he knows it’s the hardest stylistic fight for him and for me, it’s just another fight, another big pay-per-view main event. I don’t remember the last time I fought a f—king three-round prelim fight like some of these other bums that call out my name.
“I think it’s a great stylistic fight, southpaw to southpaw and I don’t think he can keep up with my well-roundedness. He’s going to be guessing the whole time, am I taking him down, or am I striking? Am I taking him down or am I striking? Now, I’m a black belt under sensei [Daniel] Valverde, my submission skills, my finishing skills, I’m coming to put this dude lights out. He’s ain’t making it 25 minutes come December 16 in T-Mobile Arena, Las Vegas, Nevada.”
Covington, who has just one win inside of the Octagon since 2020, has caught some backlash after receiving the next UFC welterweight title shot. Other members of the division — specifically Belal Muhammad — may have deserved it more, but Covington did everything in his power to secure this title fight.
As for the fight itself, “Chaos” believes he’ll be too much for Edwards and “Rocky” will be in too deep from the opening bell.
“My prediction is complete domination, just from second one to however long it goes,” Covington said. “He’s not going to have a glimmer of hope in this fight. I want to go out there and really set an example that he isn’t going to want to fight me in a rematch. He’s going to probably want to retire or go fight someone else where he knows he has a chance against them. He’s going to find out on Dec. 16 live on pay-per-view.”
Do you agree? Can Covington dominate Edwards come UFC 296?
Sound off!
This story originally appeared on MMA Mania
