Alexander Gustafsson (18-4) is recovered from surgery and in training, and now the UFC wants “The Mauler” to take on former middleweight champion Luke Rockhold (16-4). Dana White revealed the intent of getting the matchup on the UFC Unfiltered podcast on the UFC 227 card on August 4th in Los Angeles.
While Gustafsson will be waiting to see if UFC light heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier will ever drop to light heavyweight, pending his scheduled heavyweight challenge on July 7th at UFC 226 against champion Stipe Miocic.
“I want to fight DC for the belt. I lost to him, so I want my rematch and take the belt from him.” says the Allstars Training Center fighter that lost a split decision in his second title shot back in October of 2015.
The “Mauler” is on a two fight winning streak with his prior bout over Jan Blachowicz in September of 2016 and his most recent stoppage of Glover Texeira last May in Stockholm.
Rockhold captured the middleweight title back in December of 2015 by defeating Chris Weidman. He most recently lost the interim title bout to Yoel Romero in February. This will be his debut in the higher weight class.
“This will not be for the interim title” says White.
