Paulo Costa believes that he will be offered the title shot when he defeats Robert Whittaker at UFC 298.
Costa will face Whittaker in a co-main event bout this weekend. The Brazilian is coming from a year and a half of break after defeating Luke Rockhold in August 2022. Despite this long rest, he is confident in making another win. With this, “The Eraser” has a warning for the former middleweight champ.
“I just hope he brings the best version of himself,” Costa said during the UFC 298 pre-fight news conference. “I’m prepared to show I’m different from that guy that you guys saw against (Marvin Vettori) or against Luke Rockhold. I did a lot of improvements. I’m faster. I’m more dangerous than before.”
New middleweight champ Dricus Du Plessis is currently eyeing former two-time middleweight champ Israel Adesanya for his first title defense. Both parties are interested in the idea (whether it would be at UFC 300 or UFC Africa), but there’s still no official word from the promotion about this. For Costa, nonetheless, a win over “The Reaper” is enough to derail that plan and be the next opponent of “Stillknocks.”
“I don’t see another way different than going straight for the belt after I beat Whittaker on Saturday,” Costa said. “I have no other way to go. I think after (I) beat him, when you look at the whole division, you have a couple of guys who fight the way that people want to see, that people like to see the fights going on. It’s me. Beating him, I’ll be the next in the line.”
