Nurmagomedov Leaks His Own Weakness Ahead of UFC Title Fight vs Dvalishvili

Umar Nurmagomedov may have exposed a big weakness he’s unable to properly rectify before one of the biggest fights of his life.

The 29-year-old, a Sambo MMA fighter unbeaten in 18 total bouts, challenges Merab Dvalishvili for the UFC’s bantamweight title in the UFC 311 co-feature, on the same night as Islam Makhachev is tasked with defending his UFC lightweight championship against challenger Arman Tsarukyan.

Merab Dvalishvili & Umar Nurmagomedov’s pro MMA records (as of 03/01/25)
	Merab Dvalishvili	Umar Nurmagomedov
Fights	22	18
Wins	18 (3 KOs, 1 Sub)	9 (2 KOs, 7 Sub)
Losses	4	0
Draws	0	0

It’s a fight, though, that his representative, Dominance MMA boss Ali Abdelaziz, reportedly advised him against taking. While explaining why, in an interview with ESPN MMA, Umar may have said the quiet part out loud as he seemed to accidentally unearth a potential chink in his armor.

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Umar Nurmagomedov May Have Inadvertantly Leaked a Weakness

It will give Merab Dvalishvili an additional strategy in attempt to thwart Umar’s title challenge

Explaining an injury that he’s carrying into the fight in little more than two weeks’ time, Nurmagomedov said that it all happened when he was in Dagestan, and received a punch to the arm. It turns out, when he went to the doctor who performed an x-ray, “They said, ‘You broke [your arm]’.”

After 20 days, he said, he was able to implement running into his training regime once again. “Even that time, I try to run, try to do shadowboxing, try to be in shape. And after 20 days I go again, and it’s become much better.”

Abdelaziz advised him against competing so soon.

“Then I called my manager Ali and I said to him, ‘Hey, I want to fight.’ He said, ‘But we said we’re injured,’ and I said, ‘I told you, take this fight’.”

“My manager and my brother said, ‘Are you crazy? You can’t fight like that,’ and they said no.”

Desperate for another hot fight on the UFC 311, UFC asked Umar once again if he was able to make it. “Will you fight Merab,” Nurmagomedov said they asked him. “Of course,” was his answer.

“I already called with Ali and said make it happen. I want to fight in Ramadan, if Merab wants to fight in Ramadan I want to be active.”

A glaring issue is that, if Dvalishvili and his camp become aware of the injury, then they may target it to try and fracture it worse and win the fight.

The event airs on ESPN as a pay-per-view from the 18,000-capacity Intuit Dome in Inglewood, California.