Topuria: “I respect those two, Blessed and Korean Zombie, but it’s time for them to retire. Sean, keep climbing up and maybe one day we’ll share the octagon, and you, Alex Volkanovski, get ready to tap! There’s a master class waiting for you.”
O’Malley: “So I’ve already stepped up, now it’s your turn.”
Topuria: “I find this fight too easy a challenge and I’d like to find a compelling reason to face you, but so far I don’t see anything that would get my attention. Keep stepping up and let’s see if you deserve my time on you one day.”
O’Malley: “Pass the Wolf, and I’ll decide.”
Topuria: “You’re not going to pass Merab Dvalishvili to get to me, so sit and wait like the good little dog that you are.”
Sean O’Malley, who took the championship belt from Aljamain Sterling a week ago, said in a post-fight interview that he would move up to welterweight for a second title if Elijah Topuria dethrones Alexander Volkanovski.
Whether the Georgian welterweight will become the Australian champion’s next opponent is not yet known, while the American plans to make the first defense of his title in December against Ecuadorian Marlon Vera, who handed him the only defeat of his career three years ago.