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Valentina Shevchenko is getting ready for her next title defense which takes place this June at UFC 251 when she takes on Joanne Calderwood. It'll be a quick 4-month turnaround for Shevchenko, who has established herself as the seemingly invincible Queen of the Flyweight Division (125 lbs).
Shevchenko was a close observer of the latest Strawweight Championship fight between Weili Zhang and Joanna Jedrzejczyk. Shevchenko had previously defeated Jedrzejczyk by unanimous decision to claim the 125-pound title and her first UFC Championship.
Zhang vs Jedrzejczyk at UFC 248 is being considered the greatest Women's MMA fight ever, with many claiming that it's one of the best fights in MMA history regardless of gender.
Shevchenko appeared on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show (H/T BJPENN.com) and discussed the instant classic, praising Weili Zhang, but predicting that she'll lose the title in her next defense:
“She did good. She’s strong. But you could see, once she starts [to] get the real competition, the real level of martial artist, the top level of fighters, the top level of opponent, now she has a struggle. You could see how difficult was this fight with Joanna, her fight, how difficult it was. And I really don’t see Weili defending her belt in the next title fight.”
The Flyweight Champion also believes Jedrzejczyk won the fight against Zhang.
“In my opinion, Joanna won this fight because her accuracy was more on point. And yes, she gets this inflammation on her head, but it was just one punch.”
When asked about a possible fight against Zhang, Shevchenko said:
“I’ll gladly fight her and I don’t see any difficulties in this fight,”
It would be an interesting fight, but we imagine that it would go similarly to Shevchenko's fight against Jedrzejczyk, where the former's size difference proved to be too much for the Polish Strawweight legend to deal with.
Hopefully, Shevchenko gets a step up in competition soon. Many believe that should Shevchenko get past her next opponent (which she's expected to do), a trilogy fight against Amanda Nunes would be the best option for her.
