{"id":412259,"date":"2023-02-11T04:02:33","date_gmt":"2023-02-11T09:02:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/ca\/?post_type=news&#038;p=412259"},"modified":"2023-02-11T04:04:16","modified_gmt":"2023-02-11T09:04:16","slug":"volkanovski-relishing-underdog-tag-for-historic-makhachev-fight","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/news\/volkanovski-relishing-underdog-tag-for-historic-makhachev-fight\/","title":{"rendered":"Volkanovski relishing underdog tag for historic Makhachev fight"},"content":{"rendered":"<div data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-2\">\n<p data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-2.0\">Australian UFC star Alexander Volkanovski (25 professional wins, one loss) <span data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-2.0.0\">says he has been dismissed because of his height and he senses the same preconception when he looks Russian lightweight champion Islam Makhachev (23-1) in the eyes.<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Islam Makhachev and Alexander Volkanovski face off and Volkanovski delivers a final message: &#39;I&#39;m coming for f****** everything&#39; \ud83d\ude24 <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/UFC284?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">#UFC284<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/X8sHxg8eqm\" target=\"_blank\">pic.twitter.com\/X8sHxg8eqm<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; MMAFighting.com (@MMAFighting) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MMAFighting\/status\/1624263584392806400?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">February 11, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<div class=\"\" data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-2.1\">\n<div id=\"bbccom_mpu_1_2_3\" class=\"bbccom_slot bbccom_standard_slot mpu_first_slot\" aria-hidden=\"true\" data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-2.1.$body-0\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>At 5ft 6in, the 34-year-old is among the shorter fighters on the UFC roster, but size has never hindered the Australian &#8211; it has inspired him.<\/p>\n<p>Volkanovski is the featherweight champion and the number one ranked pound-for-pound fighter and will look to make history on Saturday when he challenges Makhachev for the lightweight belt at UFC 284 in Perth, Australia.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve always been undersized and always had people trying to push that narrative, but the amount of times I&#8217;ve embarrassed them,&#8221; Volkanovski tells BBC Sport.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-6\"><span data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-6.0\">&#8220;I love when people put me as the underdog and think I&#8217;m undersized. You want to say that stuff? Cool. Just remember when I win, give me my flowers, you should reward me well when I get that job done.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-7\"><span data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-7.0\">&#8220;I obviously [fight] for my family, my team and all that sort of stuff which is so much bigger, but I&#8217;d be lying if I said it doesn&#8217;t motivate me.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-8\"><span data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-8.0\">Volkanovski described a &#8220;smirk&#8221; on 31-year-old Makhachev&#8217;s face when the pair met in Australia while promoting the fight last month.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-10\"><span data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-10.0\">&#8220;You can just see it, he&#8217;s just like &#8216;oh this guy&#8217;, as if it&#8217;s going to be a walk in the park.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"\" data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-11\"><span data-reactid=\".fcbgms14cy.0.0.0.1.$paragraph-11.0\">&#8220;Whether he thinks that or that&#8217;s just his personality and he always has a smirk on his face, I could be wrong, but I sense that he is looking at this and maybe taking it lightly and if he does, it will not end well for him.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Australian UFC star Alexander Volkanovski (25 professional wins, one loss) says he has been dismissed because of his height and he senses the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4224,"featured_media":412260,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false},"tags":[17371,17372],"news_category":[16710],"gn_keywords":[],"acf":{"announce":"The Australian challenges Russian grappler Makhachev for the lightweight belt at UFC 284","video":[]},"rank_math_focus_keyword":"","rank_math_description":"","rank_math_title":"","rank_math_robots":"","rank_math_canonical_url":"","rank_math_facebook_title":"","rank_math_facebook_description":"","rank_math_facebook_image":"","rank_math_twitter_title":"","rank_math_twitter_description":"","rank_math_twitter_image":"","rank_math_snippet_shortcode":"","rank_math_primary_category":"","rankmath_seo":{"focus_keyword":"","description":"","title":"","canonical_url":"","robots":"","facebook":{"title":"","description":"","image":""},"twitter":{"title":"","description":"","image":""}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/412259"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4224"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=412259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/412259\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/412260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=412259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=412259"},{"taxonomy":"news_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news_category?post=412259"},{"taxonomy":"gn_keywords","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/gn_keywords?post=412259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}