UFC bantamweight champion Merab Dvalishvili is open to fighting Umar Nurmagomedov despite his earlier reluctance. The Georgian went on Ariel Helwani’s YouTube show, where he revealed that the UFC had indeed offered him a fight against the #2 ranked Dagestani, to which he had agreed, on one condition.

‘The Machine’ wants the fight to be in February or March since he needs time off in January to spend the festive season of the New Year and the Georgian Christmas with his family.

“Yes, UFC told me to fight him [Umar] and I said ‘I will fight him… and that was it. And now Umar takes on other fight so I don’t know. But like I said now I don’t know anything else. All I said you know, not January because it’s the New Year and Georgian Christmas and I need the time. I said February was good for me and March,” Dvalishvili said.

Over the past few days, there has been buzz that the Dagestani will fight #8 ranked Song Yadong in the UFC’s final event of the year at UFC Tampa this December. However, Yadong’s coach and former UFC bantamweight star Urijah Faber has cast doubts on the date and has revealed that nothing has been signed yet. This means that the Nurmagomedov-Yadong will probably take place in January at UFC 311.

Either way, that means Umar will almost definitely be unavailable for a February or March booking since that would leave little time for him to rest, recover, and put in a full camp. However, ‘Young Eagle’ is in luck and may yet get to fight the champ next year as Dvalishvili is in a mood to remain quite active over 2025.

Merab Dvalishvili wants three fights in 2025 but faces a paucity of opponents for his first title defense

Speaking to Helwani, Merab Dvalishvili further revealed that he wants to fight three times in 2025, against whomever the UFC puts in front of him. “And then I will go from there. Like I said, I wanna three fights in 2025 so I’m ready… Whoever the UFC offer me, I will fight,” Dvalishvili added.

If that is the case, then Georgian is unlikely to face Umar as he wouldn’t be ready in the first quarter of 2025 after Ramadan. This, of course, raises one big question- who will be Dvalishvili’s first opponent then? Meanwhile, the champ has brought Deiveson Figueiredo into the mix who who has moved up to 135lbs and is ranked #5 there at the moment.

And to be honest, there is no one else who can face him. There is of course the possibility that Dvalishvili rematches Sean O’Malley, but that doesn’t seem to be on the cards given how their last fight went. #3 ranked Petr Yan may seem like a good candidate at first glance, but ‘The Machine’ has already fought and defeated him just last year. In addition, #4 ranked Cory Sandhagen is also not a realistic possibility since he is coming off a loss to Umar earlier this year.

Numbers #6 and #7 ranked Marlon ‘Chito’ Vera and Henry Cejudo, too, are coming off losses and thus out of the running and the rest of the top 10 have not done enough to make a serious case for a title shot. This means, that by default, the only opponent left for Dvalishvili to fight in February or March is Figueiredo, whom he originally wanted to be his next opponent. What do you think about Merab Dvalishvili’s comments to Ariel Helwani? Will we possibly see a matchup between Dvalishvili and Nurmagomedov? Let us know in the comment section below!