Sean O’Malley will soon get his title shot. He’s rumored to be next in line to face Aljamain Sterling.
He recently talked about his encounter with Umar Nurmagomedov in a bathroom. During the encounter, O’Malley was left confused about why Nurmagomedov was washing his feet, not knowing about the Islamic ritual called wudu.
O’Malley, who boasts of a 4-win streak and is highly regarded by fans for his personality, is waiting to get a title shot. He has 16 wins to his name, with only 1 loss against Marlon Vera in 2021.
During the video podcast, O’Malley mentioned how he saw Nurmagomedov in the bathroom washing his feet, which he found strange. Being unfamiliar with wudu, O’Malley initially thought Nurmagomedov was just washing his feet in a peculiar manner.
“I saw Umar [Nurmagomedov] in the bathroom. I swear to God this motherf*cker was washing his feet. Like… that’s weird. I was like, ‘were his shoes off?’ and his foot was like [up] at 90 degrees. I thought he was washing his feet,” O’Malley explained.
Wudu is a necessary purification ritual for Muslims before offering their prayer. After the initial confusion, the two athletes had a small conversation and showed mutual respect towards each other. Both also expressed their desire to share the octagon in the future.
“And then he said, ‘thank you’ and I said, ‘for what?’ And then he said that I said something good about him. Said he was a good fighter. Which he is. And I said, ‘you know we are going to fight someday. You are going to make it to the top and we’ll fight someday,” O’Malley added.
Although O’Malley’s path to the title shot seems clear, Nurmagomedov is facing difficulty in finding a worthy opponent. As almost every contender is avoiding him, the Dagestani star is currently ranked 11th in the bantamweight rankings and remains undefeated after 16 matches.