Valentina Shevchenko Feels Weili Zhang Won UFC Title Under ‘Lucky Circumstances’

UFC women’s flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko needs to see more of strawweight title holder Weili Zhang before she gives her props.

Zhang captured the UFC strawweight title with her TKO win over Jessica Andrade back in Aug. 2019. The bout lasted just 42 seconds. Fight fans have already begun to wonder how a bout between Shevchenko and Zhang would go but “Bullet” says it would be wise to pump the brakes.

Shevchenko spoke to MMAFighting.com‘s Damon Martin ahead of UFC 247 on Feb. 8, where she will put her title on the line against Katlyn Chookagian. “Bullet” said that Zhang hasn’t impressed her quite yet.

“A few months ago nobody knew the name of the Chinese girl Weili,” Shevchenko said. “I don’t know what number she was but because of lucky circumstances she became champion but she still has to prove that she is in the right place and she’s there because no one is better than her.

“Because my opinion, she still has Joanna, she’s a very hard test for her. She has Rose [Namajunas] and she’s also a very hard test for her and she has Tatiana Suarez. So before she proves that she’s better than them, I think it’s not right to jump over the stairs. It’s not right.”

Zhang has her own title defense scheduled. She’ll put her strawweight gold on the line against Joanna Jedrzejczyk in the co-main event of UFC 248. That event will take place on March 7.