It would appear that the recently crowned UFC women’s flyweight champion would welcome the opportunity to defend her title against Valentina Shevchenko as soon as possible. Following her victory over ‘Bullet’ at UFC 285, Alexa Grasso believes that the former champion had a reign that was powerful enough to justify that honor.
During an interview with some reporters, Grasso discussed how she felt set for the fight and how she couldn’t accept any other result but a victory. The 29-year-old fighter acknowledged that she got into some problems during the second round, but she provided some insight into how she was able to keep her composure and ultimately turn the battle around.
“I told you I’d finish the fight,” Grasso stated. “I had pictured it many times in my head. I only wanted to walk out of there as the champion. She changed her strategy in the second round. She took me down and I wasn’t doing great for a while there. But I kept thinking I was going to get out of it. I drilled that position a lot. The immediate rematch makes sense. She was a dominant champion. We can fight again.”
Grasso’s victory over Valentina extended her winning streak to five matches, bringing her career record to 16-3. Grasso had previously prevailed over Ji Yeon Kim, Maycee Barber, Joanne Wood, and Viviane Araujo before defeating Shevchenko. The most recent defeat for the fighter, who is now 29 years old, was in September 2019, when she was defeated by Carla Esparza, a previous champion in the strawweight division.