David Larsen 
@adminUFC rising fighter Khamzat Chimaev has seemingly squashed his beef with the former UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov. A few weeks back Khamzat Chimaev had stated that he would smash Khabib Nurmagomedov in a fight. This news made lots of headlines as many people use to think Khamzat must be admiring Khabib considering their background and fighting styles.
The Rising UFC fighter, now says it was a misunderstanding and that he didn’t mean it in a personal manner to Nurmagomedov. He meant it more on the side of being up to any challenge as a fighter ready to fight anyone.
Khamzat Chimaev explained that his statements were not against Khabib but he was just following his fighter’s mindset.
“Some guy write something about me like, ‘Khabib going to smash you,’ and I answer for this guy, but it was my wrong because I answer to some bullsht guy nobody knows,” Chimaev told Frontkick. online. “I answer him if he wants to smash me, I’m going to smash him, too. Because I’m a real man, I’m going to answer like that. If somebody says he’ll smash you, what do you want me to say? “…Some bullsht guy write, you know, and I answered to some bullsh*t guy, but nobody knows him so it’s my wrong because I answered for him.
He said ‘Khabib’s gonna smash you’ and this stuff. I said ‘If he wants to smash me’ – in my head, if somebody says this to you, of course. I’m gonna answer like ‘Nobody gonna smash me. I’m gonna smash everybody.’ If you’re a real man you have to think like that. If you’re some chicken you can not say it.”
Khamzat Chimaev also said that he has always admired Khabib and has looked up to him. He also likes his fighting style and appreciates the things Khabib has done in and out of the ring. He said that he would never hate Khabib as they are both Muslim fighters and have a lot of other similarities in regards to their background and lifestyle.
“This guy I looked up to him in the beginning, and I still look up to him because he became a champ, he’s one of the best fighters in the world,” Chimaev said. “People think I hate him, but I love him because he’s Muslim. I’m Muslim. It’s like the same like he comes from some village like me, same country. Same small republic like Chechnya, Dagestan like this is still the same. I have a lot of brothers from Dagestan, and yeah, he’ Muslim, I’m Muslim, we’re brothers – Alhamdulillah.”
“Sometimes you forget you’re famous, sometimes you forget that. I became famous like one day before and still you wake up sometimes and you don’t know. You think it’s still like normal life to you but you go off to the streets and somebody comes speaks to you.”
Khamzat Chimaev is now back to training after recovering from COVID-19. He returns to the octagon in October. He takes on China’s Li Jingliang at UFC 267 and the event is expected to take place in Abu Dhabi.
