Ilima MacFarlane Won’t Fight Anastasia Yankova For Flyweight Title

In an interview with MMA Junkie, Ilima MacFarlane said that if she becomes Bellator’s first women’s flyweight champion this year, she would fight Anastasia Yankova…but not for the belt. Here are highlights:

On not giving Yankova a title fight: “No. 1, can she even make the weight? That would be the biggest issue. And then No. 2, I don’t think honestly she’s on the same level as me as a fighter. I really haven’t been impressed by any of her fights so far. I think she has a lot of growing to do as a fighter. I just think that, honestly, I would run through her. For a title fight, I think that there are better candidates and other girls in the division that deserve a shot before she does for a title fight. But with that being said, I would totally love to fight her, anyway, and I would be willing to make it a catchweight too. I just don’t think it should be for the belt.”

On Yankova’s hype as a flyweight prospect: “I wasn’t bothered by the attention because she has a big fanbase, a big following, and it’s a business, so I wasn’t really bothered by it at all. But what really got to me was when she missed weight this last fight. I thought it was just a big slap in the face to the rest of the flyweight division – all the women who are making weight, who are cutting. Just the fact that this is her third fight that she got a catchweight, and all of us are trying to figure out what’s going on, like, ‘Why is Anastasia only fighting at 130?’ And then top it all off, she didn’t even make that weight. So I just felt that it was really disrespectful, and you know, if she can’t make 125, then don’t call herself a flyweight. Go up to bantamweight. It was more of that that kind of turned me off about her.”

On her personal opinion of Yankova: “(Yankova) would probably be the first opponent – if we were ever to be matched up against each other – that would probably be the first one that I would actually talk (expletive) to. I’m not really a big fan. She just kind of rubs me the wrong way.”