Paddy Pimblett is ready to “finish” Ilia Topuria should the two finally collide in the Octagon.
Pimblett has been heavily linked with a UFC lightweight world title shot against the defending champion, with the pair involved in a heated face-off at UFC 317.
Topuria had just beaten Charles Oliveira with a brutal first-round knockout in Las Vegas to claim the vacant lightweight championship upon his return to the division.
Now 17-0, and atop the promotion’s pound-for-pound rankings, Topuria is one of the most feared men in the sport. But Pimblett’s confidence is unwavering.
“I finish him,” Pimblett replies when asked by Standard Sport about a possible showdown. “It doesn’t go five rounds. I finish him.
“He’s a better boxer than me, and that’s about it. But we’re not boxing, we’re doing MMA striking.
The longer I wait, the more I think that it’s going to be Ilia
“I’ll kick him all around the cage and when he tries to storm in, I’ll end up taking him down and either elbow his head in until he’s unrecognisable, or choke him.”
Pimblett is currently ranked No7 in the UFC lightweight rankings following his scintillating TKO victory over Michael Chandler in April at UFC 314. The win takes his unbeaten streak on the promotion to seven.
‘The Baddy’ had been rumoured to be returning to action at UFC 321 in October, where Tom Aspinall, who tops the bill, finally sets foot back in the Octagon as the standalone heavyweight champion.
However, Pimblett put those rumours to rest.
“It doesn’t look like it’s happening in Abu Dhabi,” he said. “Nobody has got at me about a fight. I’m just sitting here waiting. I’m still training every day, but I haven’t got an opponent to focus on.
“The longer I wait, the more I think that it’s going to be Ilia. At the same time, I don’t know, because I’m just sitting here waiting, training, thinking, ‘When am I fighting?’.”
He added: “We’re fighters, we want to fight. I want to fight. This is the only fight that I do want to sit around and wait for. A world title fight.
“I want to be a world champion. Anything other than that, I’d rather just fight.”
Other names that have been thrown around for Pimblett are Justin Gaethje and Dan Hooker, both of whom have been heavily critical of the Briton in recent weeks.
Gaethje, who most recently beat Rafael Fiziev at UFC 313, dismissed the idea of facing Pimblett, going as far as saying that “if that’s the route they want me to take, then I don’t believe that they need me anymore.”
Hooker, meanwhile, has not fought in almost a year since his split-decision win over Mateusz Gamrot at UFC 305. The Kiwi recently claimed that if Pimblett were to land a title shot with Topuria, it would be “an absolute p***-take” and branded the Scouser as “the worst fighter”.
Pimblett’s focus, however, is on earning that Topuria title fight.
“The fight to make is me versus Ilia,” he said.
“Everyone knows it. Everyone wants to see it. It’s the biggest fight they can make now. There’s genuine bad blood between us. We do not like each other. That’s what sells the sport.”
Paddy Pimblett was speaking at the launch of Dr Squatch’s new ‘Manlandia’ campaign.
