Merab
Dvalishvili recently opened up about his backstage altercation
at RAF Georgia.
Dvalishvili defeated fellow former
Ultimate Fighting Championship champ Henry
Cejudo in a wrestling match at RAF Georgia in July. He later
shut down talks of a potential wrestling match against Umar
Nurmagomedov in strong words. Nurmagomedov’s friend, Ahmed
Gadzhimagomedov, then approached Dvalishvili and confronted him
about his comments.
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Dvalishvili responded by slapping Gadzhimagomedov, leading to an
all-out brawl.
Dvalishvili says Ahmed Gadzhimagomedov grabbed him by the neck
before the RAF Georgia brawl
Dvalishvili says he was relaxing backstage when Gadzhimagomedov
grabbed him by the neck and loudly confronted him in Russian. While
“The Machine” barely understands Russian, he knew Gadzhimagomedov
was talking about Nurmagomedov. Dvalishvili defends his action, saying Gadzhimagomedov had no
business meddling in the feud between him and Nurmagomedov. The
former UFC bantamweight titleholder also doubled down on his
dislike for Nurmagomedov and his manager Rizvan Magomedov for
allegedly insulting him on social media.
“I was super relaxed, super chilled and then somebody came and
grabbed my neck and pulled me over and started yelling at me in
Russian language, which I hardly understand,” Dvalishvili told
Ariel Helwani. “And he mentioned Umar. It took me a couple of
seconds to realize, ‘Who is this guy to tell me what to talk about
him? It’s between me and Umar… I have so much respect for all
Dagestani people, especially fighters. The only guy who I don’t
like from Dagestan is Umar and his sneaky manager, Rizvan. The guy
who was helping Umar disrespect me on X and Threads.”
Dvalishvili was initially hesitant to face Nurmagomedov in his
first bantamweight title defense, questioning whether the latter
deserved a title shot. They eventually locked horns at
UFC 311 in Los Angeles, where Dvalishvili handed the Dagestani
his lone professional loss, but the bitterness between the two
still persists.
Dvalishvili went on to defend his belt two more times before losing
it in his rematch with Petr Yan and
their trilogy bout is set for
UFC 333 on Oct. 24 at the Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi.
Meanwhile, Nurmagomedov picked up two wins after losing to
Dvalishvili and is set to take on Yadong Song
next at
UFC Shanghai.