After five long years of dominating his opponents, Khamzat Chimaev finally attained his goal of becoming a UFC champion this past August. Now, a new chapter has begun for ‘Borz’. He has a target on his back as other contenders are now eyeing a fight against him for the middleweight strap. However, one of those fighters seems to have upset Chimaev with his recent statement.

The middleweight division has been shaken up recently, with former champs like Israel Adesanya and Robert Whittaker getting pushed down the pecking order with the emergence of new top contenders. Dagestan native Ikram Aliskerov is also looking to get to that position and challenge Khamzat Chimaev for the title once he gets a win against Jun Yong Park at UFC 321 this weekend—something he stated during the leadup to the event in Abu Dhabi. However, the champion did not appreciate his comments.

Khamzat Chimaev is angry with Ikram Aliskerov for his double standards

Khamzat Chimaev and Ikram Aliskerov, for those who’re unaware, have a history with each other. The two middleweights used to compete under the BRAVE CF banner and fought each other once. And if you’ve guessed it already, ‘Borz’ came out on top with a stunning knockout win. Aliskerov is hoping to get one back, but Chimaev seems to be angry about the fact that he’s instigating a fight between a Chechen and a Dagestani. “Why do people give interviews to these idiots?” the middleweight champ wrote on his Instagram stories.

The Chechen star claims to have faced backlash after he once mentioned his wish to fight a fellow Russian fighter who hails from Dagestan. But the fact that now a Dagestan native is attempting to do the same but isn’t facing backlash for it has not sat well with him. “When I say I’ll fight someone from Dagestan, it’s an interethnic problem. When they say they’ll fight me, it’s sport. Stop being hypocrites,” he added.

Well, Khamzat may have called out what he perceived as a hypocritical stance, but if the time ever comes to butt heads against him, the champion is likely not going to hesitate fighting his Dagestani counterpart once more. Meanwhile, Dana White recently opened up on who could end up fighting Chimaev next, as it appears that his return is likely happening next year.

Dana White plans for Chimaev’s next fight

Prior to Reinier de Ridder‘s defeat to Brendan Allen, people were talking about the Dutchman’s chances of earning a title shot. Dana White did not confirm that speculation, but mentioned that he was keeping an eye on what happens in the fight. Now with Allen’s win, he’s in the mix with Nassourdine Imavov and Anthony Hernandez, and any one of them could end up fighting Chimaev when the UFC enters its Paramount era next year.

“Let’s see how the fight plays out. I don’t know. We did talk about him today, though. We did talk about Khamzat today, you know. So, we are talking about everyone today,” Dana White stated during the DWCS 86 post-fighter presser. “So, we will see, before we start looking at next year, and obviously the Paramount launch, the White House fight, a lot of things are going to depend on how the end of this year plays out.”

Coming back to Khamzat Chimaev’s response to Ikram Aliskerov, it would be interesting to see if the Dagestan native issues a response to the champion. But tell us what you think about it? Would you want to see a rematch between Chimaev and Aliskerov in the UFC?