😂😂😂 https://t.co/GDGgUYMbtO
— Merab “The Machine” Dvalishvili (@MerabDvalishvil)
August 28, 2024
Merab Dvalishvili doesn’t think it’s a big deal that he posted a photo of a cut on his eyelid before a title fight.
Dvalishvili is set to challenge Sean O’Malley for the bantamweight title in the main event of UFC 306 on September 14 at The Sphere in Las Vegas. “The Machine” recently posted a photo of a cut on his right eyelid that he sustained during sparring, infuriating Dana White. White blasted Dvalishvili in a press conference, saying the Georgian challenger was too “stupid” to reveal the cut before the title fight. However, Dvalishvili claims he doesn’t regret it at all and that it was just a normal part of his life. Having sustained the cut with more than three weeks to go until the fight, Dvalishvili knew it would heal quickly.
“I never regret what I did,” Dvalishvili told MMAjunkie.com. “I post everything on social media, so I posted this. And it wasn’t a big deal, because it’s been over three weeks since I was injured and I knew that the injury would take five days to heal. And this injury didn’t affect my training, my sparring, anything. And as you can see, I recovered and everything is fine. When I saw Dana was upset, of course I didn’t want to upset Dana White or UFC or anything like that. But it wasn’t a big deal, so I was very calm and relaxed. I don’t regret anything. This is who I am, this is my job, this is my life.”
Dvalishvili believes the panic he caused will help draw attention to his showdown with Sugar. Dvalishvili also reopened the stitches in his cut with kitchen scissors, at which point White said he thought “The Machine” was just “making fun” of him. Dvalishvili claims that reopening stitches is something he does regularly.
“I do that all the time,” he said. “I get cut all the time. [out] I stitched it up myself. It was normal to remove the stitches myself. I realized later that they were using big scissors. When I first tried to remove the stitches, I tried to use a knife. But the knife didn’t cut it, and it hurt a little bit. So I went in and grabbed the scissors. Sorry, I don’t have small scissors. [pair of] “Scissors. Grab some kitchen scissors.”
