Scott Coker pumps the brakes on Mousasi vs. MacDonald: It won’t happen ‘right away’

After Gegard Mousasi’s championship win over Rafael Carvalho at Bellator 200, the newly-crowned middleweight champion called out welterweight title holder Rory MacDonald in the post-fight interview at London’s SSE Arena.

MacDonald, who captured the welterweight title after beating Douglas Lima via unanimous decision in the Bellator 192 main event, responded to ‘The Dreamcatcher’ on social media and accepted his challenge.

The fighters want it, and the fans want it. But Bellator CEO Scott Coker told fans not get their hopes up too much, as it could take a while for Bellator to work out the logistics of get the fight booked.

According to Coker, Mousasi wants to take some time off to celebrate his championship win over Carvalho. Whereas MacDonald, a former UFC welterweight title challenger, wants to return to action ‘right away’.

“You have Gegard who’s at 185, and I think Rory wants to fight right away,” Coker today told Steven Marrocco of MMAjunkie in a recent interview. “So I don’t know if Gegard is going to want to fight right away. There might be a fight or two in between.”

Mousasi’s rep, Nima Safapour, confirmed that the multi-promotion champ does want to take some time off and is still ‘riding the wave’ of his big win at Bellator 200.

“Gegard is still riding the wave of his last victory,” Safapour wrote in a text. “He wants to be on holiday for a little while.”

So, while the bout does seem inevitable, it could take a while before both fighters meet on common ground and agree on a specific time and date to negotiate what could be the biggest fight in Bellator history.