Paulo Costa can now aim firmly on Kamza Chimaev.
Heading into the duel of the UFC 318 joint main event with Roman Kopylov, Costa didn’t want to fight Chimev any time soon. Costa won a confident unanimous decision over Kopirov and then told reporters that his plans have not changed, especially after Chimev gave him a personal jab on Twitter.
In response to his claim that he reached out to Costa’s girlfriend through a private message, Chimaev tweeted, “It was her who wrote it to me.” Costa addressed Chimeh’s comments during his postwar press on Saturday.
“He’s lying,” Costa said. “If the UFC allows me, I’ll be in Chicago in a few weeks.”
Chicago is the UFC 319 site, which will be held on August 16th and features Chimeff, who will be taking on Doricus Duplesis in the middleweight title. If Costa has his way, he is ready to sit on the cageside and call a match against Chimehv regardless of the outcome.
Costa has been very fired for Chimev’s potential fight and was asked at a press conference on Thursday if the feud rattles him, but Costa denied that it was.
“First of all, people say I’m shaking,” Costa said. “I was sick or nothing. I didn’t use powder or anything. I was very motivated, very focused and very trapped in this fight (with Kopirov). I told myself. So I focused 100% on this fight.
(UFC Executive) Hunter (Campbell) told me, “Paul, this is a great matchup.” I was the co-main event. Even Marvin (Vettori) and (Brendan) Allen, they are on top of me, but the UFC knows this is a great matchup, a great fight, a great comeback from me, so we’re in the co-main event here. So I gave too much focus on this battle and this victory. ”
It was a much needed victory for Costa, who had escaped successive losses to Sean Strickland and Robert Whitaker. The one-off UFC title challenger gave a sharp performance in the three rounds, kicking out Kopirov, to record his first victory since 2022.
Costa praised the coach for overhauling his strategy and helping him get back to the winning track.
“We had two losses to Whittaker and Strickland,” Costa said. “I was there and these two hurt me. I was performing better, but my game plan, my strategy wasn’t good. I was bouncing back and rebutting instead of moving forward.
“They said, ‘Paul, you’re a hunter. You’re a bully. You need to move forward, put pressure, put your hands and kicks. They’re so strong, maybe the strongest in the entire department.” That’s it, and here we are. ”