Ilia Topuria will take his first steps in the UFC’s lightweight fold this summer — but against who has to be confirmed.
Speaking at the UFC 315 pre-fight press conference in Montreal late on Thursday, UFC boss Dana White said that former featherweight champion Topuria will fight either lightweight champion Islam Makhachev or former champ Charles Oliviera in his 155-pound debut.
And what’s interesting is that the identity of Topuria’s opponent will only be confirmed after this weekend’s UFC 315 main event between welterweight champion Belal Muhammad and Jack Della Maddalena.
Speaking to Spanish media this week, as noted by MMA Fighting, Topuria stated that his next bout will come against either Makhachev or Oliveira. Essentially, if Della Maddalena wins the title bout this weekend he will likely next face Makhachev who will move up from 155-pounds, leaving Topuria to fight Oliveira.
Conversely, if Muhammad — a close friend of Makhachev — wins, he Topuria will instead fight the Russian champion and leave Muhammad to defend his crown against the next man up at 170-pounds.
“Yeah, there’s a lot of moving parts right now and yeah, that’s pretty accurate,” White told the media of the aforementioned plan.
Check out the full press conference, which also featured several other UFC 315 main card fighters, in the video below:
