Vinicius Oliveira is aiming high after a spectacular Ultimate Fighting Championship debut on Saturday.
After multiple opponent changes, Oliveira took on fellow debutant Bernardo Sopai on the preliminary card at UFC Fight Night 238. After dropping the first round on the scorecards, Oliveira came from behind to score a spectacular flying knee knockout in the final frame.
“Lok Dog” subsequently called out bantamweight contender Umar Nurmagomedov, who also fought on the same card. Nurmagomedov survived an early knockdown and went on to score a lopsided unanimous decision win over Bekzat Almakhan on the main card.
Oliveira was watching Nurmagomedov’s fight during a post-fight media scrum and labeled the Dagestani standout one dimensional. While the Brazilian initially struggled with grappling during his UFC debut, he plans on sharpening his takedown defense to tackle Nurmagomedov’s wrestling skillset.
“I would like to fight Umar Nurmagomedov,” Oliveira said during a post-fight media scrum (video via MMAjunkie.com). “I think [fighting him] now is the right moment. I was watching this [Umar’s] fight, I keep watching these fights to take all mistakes, all strategies he like to do inside the cage. I’m sure if I fight against Umar Nurmagomedov it’ll be an easy fight to me because he just have wrestling. And he [Sopai] was able to put me on the ground, but I’m training so hard my [takedown] defense.
“I’m almost sure that I’m able to defeat this guy in first round. Because my mistake was today only my takedown defense. But now I go back to the gym and I train so hard so it don’t happen again.”
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