Umar Nurmagomedov may be heading into the biggest fight of his career with a serious injury, if a newly recovered interview is anything to go by.
The rising Russian star will face Merab Dvalishivili for his bantamweight title at UFC 311 in the co-main event of the first pay-per-view of the year. He is undefeated and has risen through the ranks to earn his title shot, which came after his UFC Tampa main event with Song Yadong was canceled.
But it seems all is not well in the Nurmagomedov camp as he prepares for the most important night of his life…
Umar Nurmagomedov details injury concerns ahead of Merab Dvalishvili fight at UFC 311
In a recent interview with ESPN MMA and the official UFC YouTube channel, Umar Nurmagomedov discussed an injury he suffered late last year. His management warned him not to fight, but he was keen to compete before Ramadan, which takes place in March.
Host Brett Okamoto wondered how he was now set to face Dvalishvili after previously claiming he wouldn't be able to compete in another fight in January due to injury. If the title fight had not happened, the Russian says he would have taken the fight to stay busy this month.
“After I was in Dagestan, I hit my arm,” he told Okamoto. “I'm going to show the doctor and I'll show them. They didn't do an MRI, but when did they check bone? An x-ray? They took x-rays and said, 'You're broken [your arm]'.
“You know, after that, after twenty days, I went again, even though I was broken, I was running. I still want to be in shape, you know. Even that time I try to run, I try to do shadow boxing, I try to be in shape. And after 20 days I go again, and it has become much better.
“Even my punches and other things, I wrestle, I do wrestling lessons. All I can do. Then I called my manager Ali [Abdelaziz] and I told him, 'Hey, I want to fight.' He said 'but we said we were hurt' and I said 'I told you take this fight'.
“My manager and my brother said, 'Are you crazy? You can't fight like that' and they said no. They asked again, they called me again: 'Do you want to fight with Merab?' Of course I already called Ali and said: let it happen. I want to fight in Ramadan, if Merab wants to fight in Ramadan I want to be active.”
Fans notice that Umar Nurmagomedov's interview mentioning injury has been removed
The interview was mysteriously deleted from the internet for about a day before being restored this morning. Okamoto, ESPN and the UFC have yet to comment on why the video was removed, and it appears no cuts were made to the reupload.
The discussion had not sparked widespread discussion in the MMA world over Christmas and had already been uploaded for a few days before being taken down yesterday. But some social media sleuths such as Kenny Okoye claimed the decision was made to cover up the injury.
Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC
In fact, during the same interview, Nurmagomedov theorized that Dvalishvili would be the one to withdraw from the fight. Asked if he would be surprised if he pulled out, the Russian replied: “I won't be surprised and no one will be.
“I loved seeing comments on Twitter saying he was going to pull out. But he's never pulled out before, so I'm hoping that won't be the case and the fight will happen.”
Merab Dvalishvili also suffered an injury during UFC 311
Last week it was Dvalishvili who claimed to be injured heading into the UFC 311 co-main event. He shared a video on social media saying that the UFC denied him access to the UFC Performance Institute while Nurmagomedov and his team were training there.
And he also dropped the injury news, telling fans: “I'm standing here in front of the UFC PI, and security won't let me in because they said, 'Umar Nurmagomedov is in,' and they're protecting him. Don't worry guys, I'm not going to crush him before the fight.
“But January 18 is a different story. I can't compete in UFC PI because I was going to get treatment for my injury, I had to sign some cards and I had to have lunch with my friends. Who cares? I'm going to crush this man for all the disrespect, all the lies he said.
“You better show up, Umar. Okay, today you're protected. Don't worry, I'm not going to hit you before the fight. No one will protect you on January 18th.”
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