Newark, NJ – Following his knockout victory in his promotional debut at UFC 288, middleweight Ikram Aliskerov is looking for matchups with Bo Nickal and Khamzat Chimaev.
“We’ll have to wait and see what UFC decides, but you know I know this guy. I have nothing but respect (for) him, and I know he’s a great wrestler,” Aliskerov told Cageside Press among other media through a translator at his post-fight scrum.
“But he said that he wants to fight a wrestler from Dagestan and he wants to show a Dagestani what wrestling really is so you know what? I’m ready to be that Dagestani that he fights with, and we’ll see whose wrestling is better.”
Nickal is currently booked to take on Tresean Gore at UFC 290 in July so Aliskerov would likely have to wait a while to make that fight happen. The other matchup he would like, and this one would be tougher to get, is a rematch with Chimaev who defeated Aliskerov in 2019.
“My goals in the UFC immediately is to get to 10, a top 10, top 5 (ranking). I know this guy’s in that area so I’m sure that we’ll see each other,” Aliskerov said.
“For now it’s not the rematch that I’m thinking about. My goal is to get to top 10, top 5 as soon as possible.”
Watch the entire post-fight scrum with Ikram Aliskerov above.
