Michel Pereira explains why he won’t fight Roman Dolidze at UFC Louisville

Michel Pereira will not be fighting Roman Dolidze at UFC Louisville after all.

Pereira took to Instagram on Friday to reveal he agreed to compete on the June 8 card in Kentucky, but turned down the offer when the UFC said Dolidze would be his opponent. Both middleweights train at Xtreme Couture in Las Vegas.

“I didn’t agree to this fight,” Pereira said in Portuguese. “The man trains with me every day at the P.I., at Xtreme Couture. He agreed to it, but I haven’t. To me, it’s not the moment to fight him. If he agreed to it, that’s his problem. I was surprised he agreed to it, really. To me, in my head, he’s a training partner, a friend. I see I’m not.”

Pereira said he knows he will have to end up facing training partners in the UFC eventually, but was not prepared to find a new gym to prepare for a fight in less than a month.

“I would have to find another gym and organize everything to fight him,” Pereira said. “That’s why I didn’t accept it. He trained at Xtreme, and since I’m new there, I would have to go out and train somewhere else. I don’t even know where I would train. It’s too much logistics to fight in a month.”

Pereira was recently victorious twice in a span of two months in the UFC, beating Michal Oleksiejczuk and Ihor Potieria in bonus-winning performances to boost his win streak to eight straight. Dolize lost his past two bouts to Marvin Vettori and Nassourdine Imavov.

“I’ll remove him from [a list] of those I won’t fight and add to [a list] of those I’d fight,” Pereira said. “I’ll organize myself to fight him. When they offered me a fight [at UFC Louisville], they didn’t say the opponent. It was a bummer when they said the opponent, and I said no.”

UPDATE: Dolidze chimes in.