Cordeiro: Dos Anjos wants to erase loss to Nurmagomedov
Rafael dos Anjos had a transformative showing against Anthony Pettis at UFC 185 last week.
The newly-minted lightweight champion completely dominated Pettis, piecing together the most complete performance of his career while controlling all five rounds of the 25-minute affair.
"Rafael is a great athlete, I love to work with him," dos Anjos' trainer, Rafael Cordeiro, told Combate (as translated by BloodyElbow.com's Lucas Rezende). "We've been going strong together for the past 10 years. Most of my fighters enter fights as underdogs, but we use that as motivation. We knew how to beat Pettis in every aspect of the game, and everything we practiced led us to this victory. Rafael fought the champion and also as a champion. He was dominant like a champion, and it certainly was the best performance of his life. It’s not everyday someone dominates Pettis like that."
Following the fight, it was revealed that dos Anjos had fought through an MCL injury, and at one time even considered pulling out of the bout entirely.
"I don't really like when a fight ends and one of the guys says he fought injured," Cordeiro said. "Though Rafael did, I know he's not looking to take advantage of that. His will was much stronger than the pain. He ignored it for three weeks, not even kicking with his right leg, but still fought like a champion. What happened was that one day he wore a shin pad that was a bit big for his size, so it slipped down his leg and then it twisted his knee. I was worried at first, but afterwards he was able to pull through with only one leg."
According to UFC president Dana White, dos Anjos will defend his title against the winner of a UFC 187 bout between Donald Cerrone and Khabib Nurmagomedov. Nurmagomedov absolutely dominated an encounter with dos Anjos at UFC on FOX 11 back in April of 2014, but has been sidelined with a knee injury ever since.
"Khabib will probably win and then we can erase that loss that's been bugging us so much," Cordeiro said. "It'll be a tough fight, our wrestling and jiu-jitsu will have to be on point, but this time we will break him down. Our time has come and we will go strong."