Alex Volkanovski was planning to fight Ilia Topuria at UFC 297.
Unfortunately, “The Great” was knocked out by Islam Makhachev after rolling the dice and gambling on a short-notice call-up for the UFC 294 pay-per-view (PPV) main event last month in Abu Dhabi. As a result, concussion protocols — along with some creative matchmaking — sent the featherweight champion to UFC 298.
“Yeah obviously it was scheduled for January,” Volkanovski told Fox Sports Australia. “We just thought that would be a little bit too soon, you know what I mean? We want to follow all protocols and do everything right, obviously, after the last one and I’m lucky enough to have a great team around me, who’ve dealt with a lot of concussions in football and what-not. We thought that January was a little too soon and I was lucky enough to have UFC and other guys there make that happen and move things around for me, which I’m grateful for. I think the timing will be perfect. I’ll be back in there soon, but not too soon.”
Topuria (14-0) kept his undefeated streak intact by beating the brakes off featherweight bruiser Josh Emmett at UFC on ABC 5 last June. “El Matador” is predicting a first-round finish in the UFC 298 headliner and remains one of the few combatants to be unimpressed by the Aussie’s lengthy title reign.
“He’s a powerful dude, he’s good everywhere,” Volkanovski said. “He’s not one-dimensional, he’s obviously very well-rounded, I just believe my skills and my understanding of the game, it’s just going to be that little bit too much for him. He’s a young, hungry dude, undefeated. Very, very confident but I think he needs a little bit of humbling, so I’m glad to be the man to do that. He’s a powerful dude, he likes his boxing, but again, I just need to show him that I’m a whole different breed. He’s gonna come in confident. Probably even more confident after my last performance. There’s a lot of people who are gonna be like, ‘What’s going on here?’ And I can’t wait to show them why I’ve been the king of this division for so long.”
UFC 298 is scheduled for Feb. 17 but does not yet have a confirmed city or venue.
This story originally appeared on MMA Mania
