Former UFC featherweight champion Max Holloway showed no signs of slowing down as he produced another top-drawer performance to defeat Arnold Allen at UFC Kansas City, then threw out the name of a fighter he’d love to face next.
Holloway finds himself in a somewhat awkward position in the UFC’s 145-pound division. He’s clearly better than the rest of the contenders at featherweight, but despite three attempts to do so, he’s been unable to defeat the man at the top of the division, Alexander Volkanovski.
It means that Holloway, despite his stellar form, has had to look elsewhere for challenges while he builds more momentum for another shot at the title. And, after halting the rise of Allen by handing the Brit his first UFC loss, Holloway told reporters during the post-fight press conference that he’d love to face off against a fellow featherweight legend, South Korean’ fan-favorite Chan Sung Jung, better known as “The Korean Zombie.”
“Korean Zombie, that’s the only guy of my time, with the older guys, that I didn’t get to fight,” he said.
“I would love that fight. There’s a fight in my agent’s country, Australia. Australia is supposed to be happening sometime, we don’t know when, and if Korean Zombie wants it, he can get it. I would love to fight him. That’s one of the guys I grew up watching.
“I’m kind of tripping on how we didn’t fight yet. How did we not fight? If that’s one of the guys, that’s one of the guys. I would love to share the Octagon with him. He’s one of the OGs that I didn’t get to fight, and we came up in the same era, and we didn’t fight each other.”
Holloway is sure to be an interested watcher when reigning champion Volkanovski puts his title on the line against interim champ Yair Rodriguez at UFC 290, with a win for the Mexican potentially opening the door to a faster route back to a title shot for Holloway.
But, despite that, Holloway declined to give a specific pick, or offer a preference, for that matchup, saying instead, “We’ll see what happens. Let the best man win. I get to be a fan in that fight in July and we’ll see what happens. Never say never. We’ll be alright.”