Robert Whittaker and Marvin Vettori
A middleweight fight between top ranked Robert Whittaker and Marvin Vettori is reportedly under the works for UFC 275 on June 11th
Robert Whittaker and Marvin Vettori, both coming off losses to the middleweight champion Israel Adesanya, have verbally agreed to fight at UFC 275.
The news was first reported by Ariel Helwani, and states that the pair is yet to sign the contract that will make it official. UFC 275 is slated to be hosted by Singapore, after travel restrictions have been eased across the globe. The UFC has some elaborate plans for 2022 and 2023, with several big PPVs to be hosted on international soil.
Robert Whittaker has had a near-perfect record, since he made the jump to middleweight. He has only suffered two losses – both at the hands of the champion, Adesanya. Similar to Whittaker, Vettori has lost two fights against Adesanya, both by decision. He has racked up a victory against Paulo Costa since that loss, at a catchweight of 205 pounds.
What this fight does to the title picture still remains a question, since both fighters have lost to Adesanya recently in the past. As for the champion, he is most likely to fight Jared Cannonier in pursuit of a fresh challenge.
Prior to UFC 272, polarizing figure Colby Covington had called out the middleweight champion Israel Adesanya for a potential fight in the future. He even claimed that ‘The Last Stylebender’ is easy work for him.
In an ideal scenario, ‘The Chaos’ has to go through the other top dogs in the division before he stakes claim at the middleweight throne. Covington isn’t the welterweight champion, where a case could have been made for a double championship quest.
Speaking about this on his Youtube channel, Sonnen berated the entire division for their feeble personality. He said, “Colby Covington tried to stake his claim at 185 pounds and you b*tches at 185 let him do it. When a 170lber calls out the king of the division and none of the other guys in the division 1-15, I don’t even know how we’re ranking all the way to 15, none of them said a word. None of them want that heat, none of them wanted Colby, and they knew if Colby came up they’d be in trouble. They didn’t wanna be the one to speak up and tell him to sit down, or the next name coming out of Colby’s mouth would’ve been theirs. So if all the middleweights are just gonna stand aside and let the man walk through, then stand aside and let him walk through.”
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