Aiemann Zahabi’s “selfish” reason behind picking Merab Dvalishvili to best Petr Yan at UFC 323

Aiemann Zahabi has his own vested interests in why he is leaning more on the “and still” side than “and new” in Saturday’s pay-per-view title challenge at bantamweight. Merab Dvalishvili aims to defend his 135-pound crown and defeat Petr Yan for a second time when the two battle in a rematch at UFC 323.

In an interview with James Lynch for Bodog, the surging Canadian bantamweight contender offered up his thoughts on the next championship clash at 135 pounds, which goes down this weekend, as Aiemann Zahabi said,

“Yeah, as much as I want Merab to win, I still think it’s going to be a 50-50 fight. Like I don’t know why people are counting him out. Like I just saw odds now on Twitter. Like I was all scrolling through X and I saw that he’s pretty much a super heavy favorite, Merab over Yan. I’m surprised to be honest especially given the fact that his hand was injured the first time around.”

“No matter what you think of how good Merab is, you can’t count a guy out like Petr Yan. Petr Yan has all of the restrouces to make up his shortcomings in the first fight. He’s got a great coaching staff, he’s one hundred percent committed, he has no financial issues, right. So he is committed to training, one hundred percent. There’s nothing he’s doing other than getting better and training really, really hard and I believe the same thing for Merab.”

Aiemann Zahabi is “rooting for Merab” and explains why

As the number seven ranked bantamweight contender in the UFC kept expounding up his breakdown of Merab Dvalishvili vs. Petr Yan 2 on December 6th at UFC 323, Zahabi continued,

“So I think this fight is much closer to 50-50. If you want to say 55 percent chance for Merab over Yan but I wouldn’t say like 80 percent chance Merab. Like that’s just way too much in my opinion, in my humble opinion. I think there’s nothing else Petr Yan wants [more] than getting that title back. So I think we’re gonna see a very hungry, motivated Petr Yan.”

“But unfortunately and I don’t mean this in a disrespectful way, I’m rooting for Merab because it’s a clearer path for me. If Yan wins, he’s got a lot of guys to defend the title before I can get up there and I might have to fight one or two more times. Whereas if Merab wins, I feel like it’s a shorter path for me. So that’s my selfish take on the fight [laughs].”