UFC strawweight champion, Zhang Weili will defend her title against the former champion, Rose Namajunas at UFC 261. Zhang Weili is coming off a huge win over Joanna Jedrzejczyk while Namajunas is coming off a win over Jessica Andrade.
It will be safe to crown the winner of this fight as the greatest UFC strawweight ever. Both Rose Namajunas and Zhang Weili have wins over some of the best strawweight in the division such as Joanna Jedrzejczyk, Jessica Andrade. Rose Namajunas has a KO win over Jedrzejczyk while Zhang Weili finished Andrade to become the strawweight queen. So the winner of this fight will have the most impressive resume in the strawweight division. But, who will get his hands raised at UFC 261?
Can Rose Namajunas win back the UFC strawweight title?
The strawweight champion, Zhang Weili is the favorite going into the fight, and rightfully so. She is on a 20 fight win streak in her MMA career. She is unbeaten in UFC and she beat the former champion in her last fight.
On the other hand, Rose Namajunas fought Jessica Andrade in her last fight after a long hiatus from the sport. After getting knocked out in the first fight against Andrade, Namajunas avenged her loss in the rematch. However, the rematch was extremely close as well.
Read More: Robert Whittaker’s career earnings from UFC
Rosa Namajunas won the first round fairly comfortably. However, she was in trouble in the third round. And if it had been a 5 round fight Andrade would have pushed Namajunas to the limit and possibly could have beaten her. But, there were a lot of factors working against Namajunas in that fight.
Ring rust was one of them as she was making her return after a long time off. She was coming off a KO loss as well. So we might see a much better version of Rose Namajunas against Zhang Weili at UFC 261. However, it still might not be enough to beat the strawweight champion.
Zhang Weili is just a better fighter than Rose Namajunas. She hits harder, she is more athletic and explosive and she is a legit knock-out artist. Rose Namajunas might have an advantage in skills and she might be a better boxer, but overall Zhang Weili will have more tools in her arsenal to inflict damage on her opponent.
Read More: Conor McGregor’s managers reveals the truth behind the $500k donation controversy
Zhang Weili fought a much better version of Joanna Jedrzejczyk who was not struggling with weight cut issues. She also knocked out Jessica Andrade inside one round, something Rose Namajunas has not been able to do in her last two fights. And it’s very likely that the champion will get a finish over Namajunas in the later rounds at UFC 261.
Zhang Weili vs Rose Namajunas Prediction: Zhang Weili by TKO