Khabib confirms his position on fighting future

Khabib Nurmagomedov has confirmed that he has no plans to come out of retirement in the future.

“The Eagle” officially walked away from the sport of competitive mixed martial arts after beating Justin Gaethje via submission at UFC 254. Many expected him to stick to that promise and after almost a year out of the game, it doesn’t appear as if he’s gearing up for a return any time soon.

Khabib Nurmagomedov: the greatest

The 155-pound division is beginning to move on with a whole lot of exciting prospects making their way up through the ranks and in the midst of all that is none other than reigning UFC lightweight champion Charles Oliveira. “Do Bronx” earned the right to call himself the king after beating Michael Chandler earlier this year, with some wondering whether or not that’d be enough to lure the GOAT back to the octagon.

Alas, it wasn’t, with TMZ Sports recently deciding to try and prod the bear one more time – to no avail.

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Khabib is instead focusing his attention on coaching with his students going unbeaten last weekend at Bellator 263. One of his prospects, Usman Nurmagomedov, is being tipped to become one of the next great Russian stars in the sport, with a parade of other talents just waiting to rise up through the ranks.

It’s likely that we’ll see Khabib compete in some kind of amateur or friendly setting at some stage but competitively, he’s more likely to transition over to a career in football than to resume his UFC days.

Khabib’s fans will hate that idea and his haters will want nothing more than for him to stay away, but whatever the case may be, he’ll forever be respected within the MMA community for what he accomplished during his 29-0 run.

Featured image credit: Getty