UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski hopes his next title defense is at home.
With Brian Ortega dominating Chan Sung Jung last weekend at UFC on ESPN+ 38, Volkanovski finally has the clear-cut contender he’s been looking for.
Volkanovski (22-1 MMA, 9-0 UFC) initially was targeting a December return but knows it’s highly unlikely that Ortega would turn around that quickly. Both men last competed in Abu Dhabi, and with the idea of a potential crowd almost coming to fruition for UFC 254 on Saturday, Volkanovski has an alternative option.
He wants the UFC to return to Australia or New Zealand, where Rugby games have been holding full capacity crowds, with the COVID-19 pandemic largely under control in those countries.
“Australia, New Zealand, we’re holding crowds over here,” Volkanovski told ESPN. “We had the Wallabies and All Blacks in New Zealand with 30,000 people. We’re gonna have 40,000 this weekend. Bring it over here. We could do it. Let’s make a game plan. Obviously we got the fighters here to make it a cracker card, and you can bring people here, make game plans so the quarantine’s gonna work and what not. Let’s do it.”
Volkanovski admits that he thought Jung would win but ultimately thinks that the way Ortega (15-1 MMA, 7-1 UFC) shut down Jung certainly warrants him a title shot.
“He was a completely different fighter,” Volkanovski said. “If he went out there and just slugged it out and didn’t show improvements, it would be hard to be like he is ready for another shot. But to go out there and completely change your game, Ortega 2.0, it makes sense. To go out there and take ‘Zombie’ out like he did, it was pretty impressive. He didn’t just go out there and land a lucky punch or a lucky submission. He went out there and dominated and beat him from start to finish, and that’s impressive.”