“Suga” Sean O’Malley avenged the only loss of his career in style with a clean sweep of the scorecards in the main event of UFC 299 and after getting his hand raised in victory, the flashy star made an ambitious call-out.
After piecing up and outclassing Marlon Vera over the course of five rounds to defend his bantamweight title, O’Malley challenged Ilia Topuria to a fight on the featherweight champion’s home soil.
“Dana, get me a jet to Spain, baby, I’m coming for Ilia Topuria,” O’Malley said, pleading to UFC president Dana White to set up a champion vs. champion matchup at a stadium in Europe.
The undefeated 145-pound champion won his title when he knocked out Alexander Volkanovski at UFC 298 in February.
“He’s a scary (expletive) dude,” O’Malley said of Topuria. “Ilia excites me, going up a weight class excites me, but honestly I’m here for whatever. If you guys want me to knock out Merab (Dvalishvili), I’ll do that too but Ilia’s an exciting fight for the people.”
Topuria, 27, is 7-0 in the UFC and does not yet have a title defence.
O’Malley, 29, is now 10-1 with one no-contest in the UFC with one title defence after originally winning the title from Aljamain at UFC 292 last summer.
White didn’t sound overly intrigued about the idea at the post-fight press conference.
“I don’t know about moving divisions,” White said before indicating he prefers champions focus defending their own divisions, especially so soon after they've become a champion.
White has said in recent weeks that Dvalishvili would be next in line to fight for the bantamweight title and he served as the official backup fighter for the UFC 299 main event, weighing in Friday alongside the other competitors in case a short-notice bantamweight opponent was needed.
The 33-year-old Georgian has won 10 consecutive fights dating back to 2018 and is coming off a three-round victory over former two-weight champion Henry Cejudo at UFC 298.
“It’s nice having options,” O’Malley said at his post-fight press conference. “It’s hard to make a decision right after a fight. We’ll see how it plays out. I’ll talk to the UFC and we’ll see what happens.”
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