Wanderlei Silva will be returning to action for the first time in a four years when he headlines Bellator 180 against longtime rival Chael Sonnen.
Once his battle with Sonnen comes to an end, the Brazilian slugger has a few other fighters he wants to get revenge on.
"I would like a rematch against Vitor Belfort, Quinton Jackson, and Dan Henderson. There's a lot of classic guys that would make a cool fight against me. That's because there's too many fights going on these days, but no classics where everyone stops to watch them. A cool rivalry, with good marketing. There's been some good fights, obviously, but classics? With big name guys? It just doesn't happen anymore. They're all retiring, quitting. We need to bring back those guys so that through those classic fights, we can promote new names and make them become legends and fighting classic fights in the future like us,” Silva said to Fox Sports.
Of the three names on the list, the only one Silva has defeated before is Quinton Jackson, whom Silva defeated twice in PRIDE.
Silva will be making his Bellator MMA debut at Bellator 180 and the fighter is debuting with a company that he has high hopes for.
"Bellator is growing a lot. They have a much bigger number of shows now. They're really starting to build their champions, so kudos to them. The company growing non-stop, no doubt about it. Nowadays, Bellator is the number two company, but on June 24, everyone's saying it'll be number one. That's the day we'll beat the UFC, who cancelled their event and changed it to a different day out of respect for us. They're afraid of this show we're putting on, that will be huge, no doubt about it,” says Silva.
Bellator 180 takes place on Saturday, June 24 from Madison Square Garden in New York, New York with Chael Sonnen and Wanderlei Silva headlining. Fightful is providing live coverage of the event, with a post-show podcast to follow.
