Dana White Likes Zhang as Future Foe for Shevchenko More Than Nunes Trilogy

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As Amanda Nunes’ reign continues over two divisions in the Ultimate Fighting Championship, it has become difficult to target future opponents for the Brazilian star.

In the wake of Nunes’ dominant decision victory against Felicia Spencer in the UFC 250 headliner, neither “Lioness” nor UFC president Dana White had a clear answer as to what lies ahead for the American Top Team product. However, White is confident that new challengers will eventually emerge.

“When you think of opponents, you think back to Anderson Silva, Jon Jones, many others that we were sitting here having the same conversation, ‘Who’s next?’” he said at Saturday’s post-fight press conference. “There’s always somebody next.”

However, it doesn’t appear that a trilogy with reigning flyweight queen Valentina Shevchenko is in the cards for Nunes. The two-division champion defeated Shevchenko via unanimous decision in their first meeting at UFC 196 and then by split decision in a bantamweight title tilt at UFC 215. Although Shevchenko is one of the few fighters to be competitive with Nunes, White has something different in mind for “Bullet,” who has been just as dominant at 125 pounds.

“For the third time and Amanda won twice? No, I don’t think that’s the right fight for Valentina,” White said. “If you look at Amanda, she’s the queen of two divisions right now — 35 and 45. I think what you see before that is a couple more wins from Weili [Zhang] and that fight happening before you see her fight Amanda again.”

Zhang, the reigning champion at 115 pounds, is currently on a 21-fight professional winning streak and is coming off a memorable split-decision victory against Joanna Jedrzejczyk at UFC 248 this past March.