Tony Ferguson on UFC 223: ‘You’re stripping me of a title because of that performance?’

For the fourth straight time, the UFC was forced to scrap the much awaited Tony Ferguson vs. Nurmagomedov matchup on April 1^st. It was determined that “El Cucuy” would be unable to fight, after tearing his knee in a slight mishap during a media obligation in late March.

Initially, UFC president Dana White announced that Ferguson would be stripped of his interim title, only to take it back four days later. In the UFC 223 post-fight press conference, Whiet then said Khabib is the only fighter at lightweight with a title, indicating that Conor McGregor and Ferguson no longer have belts. Khabib, however, went through a list of replacement opponents that had Max Holloway and Anthony Pettis, until he eventually ended up facing Al Iaquinta.

Nurmagomedov fought Iaquinta to a dominant unanimous decision win, but according to Khabib, his team was not too happy with his performance. Another individual who was apparently left unimpressed is Ferguson, who shared his post-fight sentiments in a recent tweet he posted.

For his part, Khabib is still open to making this fight happen, as long as Ferguson earned his shot first.

“I keep wanting this fight to be honest, but you guys remember when I pull out the last time atUFC 209, you guys remember this, and UFC tell me ‘you want to deserve title shot, you have to fight, you have to fight with some tough guy,’” Khabib said in his post-fight presser (transcript via MMA NYTT). “OK, I make mistake. Because when you have injury this is your fault.”

“Now you have injury, please come back and fight with somebody and deserve this and that’s it.

The 34-year-old Ferguson is currently on a ten-fight win streak. He last fought at UFC 216 in October, where he defeated Kevin Lee via third-round submission, en route to winning the interim 155-pound title.