Former UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski should resume his hunt for UFC gold sooner rather than later, according to one of his coaches.
Volkanovski has been absent from the cage since a knockout defeat to Ilia Topuria back in February in a fight that saw the Australian experience the sting of defeat at 145-pounds for the first time in his extensive, championship-winning career. Prior to that, Volkanovski also suffered a knockout defeat — this time to Islam Makhachev in an unsuccessful (and short notice) bid to win the UFC’s lightweight world title.
But amid rumours of a potential rematch with Topuria next year, or a top contender bout with Diego Lopes, Volkanovski’s coach at Freestyle MMA, Joe Lopez, feels like it’s time to return to action to maximise his potential amid the prime years of his fight career.
“I would have said six to eight months was plenty, you know,” Lopez said in an interview with Submission Radio, via MMA Insight. “Now we’re coming up to nearly 12 months. And it’s a bit too long.
“And that’s if [a Topuria rematch in] Spain goes ahead,” he added. “They have trouble booking the stadiums over there because they’re all booked, out I guess. Now we just really want to get back in there. Because it’s been too long a break. Alex is itching.”
But if Volkanovski’s next assignment is indeed Diego Lopes, the winner of five straight in the Octagon at 145-pounds, Lopez says that the Brazilian fighter will be a tough task given his recent momentum.
“You start taking a few wins and all of a sudden your confidence grows and with that you grow as a fighter,” Lopez said of Volk’s possible next opponent. “There’s little things that can separate them and a lot of times it’s that little mental edge. You’re on such a high and you’re so confident that your body and your mind and everything just thinks and reacts differently than the other fighters.”
