UFC featherweight champion and #3 ranked pound for pound fighter on the planet, Alexander “The Great” Volkanovski, admits that he was “pretty silly” in pursuing the trilogy fight with Max Holloway.
Volkanovski was scheduled to defend his featherweight title against Holloway once more on April 8, but an injury forced Max Holloway out of the bout, and led to The Korean Zombie stepping in as replacement. Holloway ended up healing well ahead of schedule, and Volkanovski accused him of faking the injury to duck the fight.
Volkanovski Still Wants Holloway Trilogy Despite “Pretty Silly” Baiting
Speaking to Submission Radio, Volkanovski regretted the decision. “It was frustrating because at the time I really wanted that fight, you know what I mean, and once you heard he got injured, especially when they announced it earlier, it was all a bit confusing and frustrating.
So you seen my frustration obviously. I wanted to tweet and have a little shot at Max and his fans, and that was the only reason, which was pretty silly on my behalf, to be honest. That just shows you where sort of my head was at back then, you know what I mean? That’s something that I’ve really been working on lately.”
Volkanovski dethroned Max Holloway back in 2019 to claim the featherweight championship. Less than a year later, Holloway was granted the opportunity to reclaim his title, but Volkanovski once again emerged victorious, albeit via controversial split decision. Since then, he defended his title once, against Brian Ortega, once again winning via decision.
Holloway has since strung together two wins, over Calvin Katter and Yair Rodriguez, to return to title contention. However, there are many – mostly Max Holloway fans – who claim Volkanovski lost the rematch. This does not please Alexander “The Great”.
“I’m such a people pleaser, right? I always want people on my side and when they’re not, I take whatever they say to heart and all that type of stuff.
So, I’ve always cared what haters said and like what all these people would say. So I always felt like I had something to prove and wanted to get back at him, but now I literally don’t give a F about any of that.”
Alexander Volkanovski will once again defend the featherweight title on April 9 at UFC 273 when he takes on Chan Sung Jung. Should he be successful in the defense, it lines up a trilogy fight for Volkanovski against Max Holloway, likely before the end of the year.
Do you want to see Volkanovski vs Holloway 3? Let us know in the comments.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bimKDKIK-x0
