Jairzinho Rozenstruik happy he got Francis Ngannou’s attention, confident he could knock him out
Esther Lin, MMA Fighting
With only four seconds remaining in the fight, Jairzinho Rozenstruik added another knockout to his resume after knocking out Alistair Overeem in his first-ever UFC main event.
Rozenstruik accepted the opportunity on short notice following a 29-second drubbing of former heavyweight champion Andrei Arlovski, and he obviously made the most of it.
Now with a 4-0 record inside the Octagon, he’s looking to hunt even bigger game.
Rozenstruik hopes to fight ferocious knockout artist Francis Ngannou next, and “The Predator” was definitely watching on Saturday night after he sent out a message on Twitter acknowledging the fifth-round finish at UFC on ESPN 7.
I heard you babayga. You made yourself very clear tonight. Congrats on your come back by the way.#uncrowndedchamp ☝️#UFCDC
— Francis Ngannou (@francis_ngannou) December 8, 2019
“I like it,” Rozenstruik said in response to Ngannou’s message. “If he accepts, I’m excited about it. I’m going to see him soon then.”
With four fights already in the books for 2019, Rozenstruik is looking to stay just as busy next year with a targeted return date in either March or April following this latest win.
Meanwhile, Ngannou has recently called out Alexander Volkov for his next fight but the win by Rozenstruik on Saturday night might have added another intriguing option.
With a combined 12 knockouts between them in the UFC, Rozenstruik and Ngannou definitely pack a lot of power whenever they start throwing punches. Rozenstruik is quick to point out that Ngannou is just as frightening as advertised. But that’s exactly why he wants to become the first person in history to knock him out.
“I think it’s going to be a really good fight,” Rozenstruik said. “I mean he’s strong, he’s big. Even when I’m going to look at him like you’re big, you’re scary but we have to do it.
“For me, sure [I can knock him out]. If I hit you, if I get that big head of him, yeah we will see right away, for sure.”
Considering the momentum behind Rozenstruik right now, it might be hard for the UFC to ignore his request and a fight against Ngannou could be on the horizon in the near future.