It’s safe to say that Nassourdine Imavov is the obvious next challenger for the UFC middleweight championship – but according to the man himself, that may not happen as soon as some would have expected.

Last weekend, Sean Strickland defeated Khamzat Chimaev to become the new UFC middleweight champion. While some would like to see Chimaev get an immediate rematch, that’s unlikely, especially given that he has indicated he wants to move up to the light heavyweight division. Nassourdine Imavov, meanwhile, has been waiting patiently for a title opportunity for a while now.

Some even felt like Nassourdine Imavov should have been the one to get the call to face Chimaev ahead of Strickland, but that didn’t quite come to fruition. Now, you would have thought that all possible obstacles are out of the way, but with Dricus du Plessis holding two wins over Strickland, there’s every chance we could see them run that one back in a trilogy bout.

In a recent video posted to social media, Nassourdine Imavov made his feelings clear with a very silly AI video.

Nassourdine Imavov’s AI skit

In the video, Imavov is shown to be growing old as other middleweight fighters get countless opportunities, whereas he is simply left to age, before apparently taking on Bruce Buffer at UFC 992. Make of that what you will.

The big hope is that Imavov can finally get his chance to prove himself at the championship level. The 31-year-old has won his last five fights in the UFC, and his last defeat actually came against Strickland back in early 2023, although it did take place up at light heavyweight.

Strickland himself has acknowledged that this is the fight that seems to make the most sense, and if the promotion can make it happen, you can bet Sean will do his best to sell it to the masses. Sure, some of the ‘appeal’ of his trash talk may have worn off slightly after he admitted to manufacturing a good portion of it, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t going to have some zingers that will make some headlines.