Peter Yan is keeping busy preparing for his bantamweight clash against Sean O’Malley. Yan seems aware the O’Malley is UFC’s attempt to cozy up to the younger demographics and as such has a significantly higher profile than any other clash between a former champion and barely in the rankings competitor.
Still, he’s in pretty good spirits. Yan has been spotted all over Abu Dhabi – and he’s consistently wrestling his colleagues.
Couple days ago Petr Yan was spotted greeting former opponent Aljamain Sterling and his Georgian friend Merab Dvalishvili at which point Yan dove on it and play wrestled Merab for a good bit.
The schtick didn’t die there either, just days later Yan spotted UFC featherweight champ Alex Volkanovski and once again displayed his unique way of greeting fellow athletes.
Despite the tension at the face offs Yan appears to be in good spirits and is a clear favorite to win against O’Malley.
“Sean is a UFC project and Conor wannabe, but the result of this matchup will be different. ” Yan said in lead up to the bout going so far as to slam O’Malley verbally during the presser.
“It says he’s 5-(foot)-7 on the (UFC) stats, but there’s no way,” O’Malley said. “He’s 5-5. I just believe I’m a lot better everywhere.”
“It’s not about the height,” Yan said. “Just look at him. He’s like a w*ore on the side of the road.”