UFC 311 faced a bit of trouble days before the date when Umar Nurmagomedov revealed that he got injured during his training. Although it was an injury that he incurred 6-7 weeks ago, with the Dagestani assuring the fighting world that he was alright now, the fans couldn’t escape the worries. Well, it’s apparently a fight without any backup fighter, and if Nurmagomedov were to pull out of the fight, Merab Dvalishvili would be left without an opponent. It seemed to have upset the bantamweight champ, but he wasn’t buying any of it. 

During an interview with MMA Fighting’s Mike Heck a few days ago, Dvalishvili weighed in on Nurmagomedov’s apparent injury. When Heck asked about ‘Young Eagle’s confidence despite the seeming setback, ‘The Machine’ responded with, “He’s bulls—ing! He’s a bulls___ guy! And I’m not buying this bulls—!” Needless to say, the champ was pretty upset about it.  

That was when the interviewer asked Dvalishvili to open up a bit more. The Georgian champ pointed out that he too had an injury, but he never showed it to the public before a fight. Injuries are indeed pretty common in MMA. But when Dvalishvili saw a video of Nurmagomedov training, he was convinced that it wasn’t serious at all. He said, “He’s bulls—ing, you know, because he said he was training, I saw he was punching bags very good, like when he arrived in Vegas. You can go and see in the video he posted, you know. He was punching bag. And if you have any problem with your hand, you won’t be able to punch the bag. And then he was punching bag very normal. I think he’s just mentioning this, like making some excuse.”

Do you know what’s the irony in this situation? Dvalishvili was also injured and regardless of that, he jumped into action. Even when he was set to fight Sean O’Malley back at UFC 306, he took to social media to reveal his injury. Let’s take a look at that, shall we?

Merab Dvalishvili reveals his own injury before the fight against Umar Nurmagomedov at UFC 311

In an exclusive interview with Bloody Elbow, Dvalishvili revealed that he was ‘seriously injured’ before. But he didn’t go too deep into details because he didn’t want to cause panic in the fanbase. He said, “I’m good now, I will post the injury or whatever after the fight, but before, I don’t want to show and panic people. You know, the injury was serious, like, not a joke. Because I take a fight on six weeks’ notice I was training hard and I get a lot of pain banged up and I was dealing with some other injuries too, but thank God now I’m OK and ready to go.”

Well, this wasn’t the only time when ‘The Machine’ talked about his injuries before a fight. Back when the UFC was preparing for its debut at The Sphere, Dvalishvili got a small cut above his eye while training. He got stitches and showed his progress on social media. No doubt, it was an act that disappointed Dana White.

After all, he was set to go up against O’Malley, who’s a precision striker. And by revealing his injury, Dvalishvili practically gave him a target for their bout. Nevertheless, it was ‘The Machine’ who won via unanimous decision and became the new bantamweight champion. Now, we need to see if he’d be able to defend the title against ‘Young Eagle’. 

What are your thoughts on Dvalishvili’s reaction to Nurmagomedov’s injury? Do you think Nurmagomedov is making an excuse? Let us know what you think in the comments down below.