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Dana White: Cris Cyborg does not want to fight Ronda Rousey

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Jayne Kamin-Oncea-US PRESSWIRE

Now that UFC President Dana White has accepted women into his promotion, he's finding it difficult to make the biggest possible match-up in Cris Cyborg vs. Ronda Rousey. But it's the former who is getting thrown under the bus.

It's well known that Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) President Dana White is a big fan of Ronda Rousey. In fact, she's probably most responsible for women coming to the Octagon on account of the fact that White is so taken by her.

Can't blame him. She's a beautiful badass.

He still has reservations about promoting women's mixed martial arts (MMA) but tells FUEL TV he's got about four or five fights they can make for Rousey while other women can step up and stand out:

"This whole women's thing, I've always told you guys that the divisions really aren't deep enough to create one. I think the 135-pound division that Ronda is in and champion of, there's four or five good fights for her over the next year, year and a half. I think you'll see a lot more women coming up in that 135-pound division ... or they won't. It's deep enough to get through a couple years and then we'll see what happens. I'm going to give this thing a shot, we're going to try it."

No different than the men, however, White is finding it difficult to make the biggest possible match-up, a 135-pound showdown between Rousey and Cris Cyborg.

Guess who he's blaming for that?

When asked when Rousey will make her debut and against who, Dana had this to say:

"That I don't know, I don't know either one of those things but it's become abundantly clear to me that Cyborg does not want to fight her. So I don't know."

The women will quickly learn, just like the men, that there are public relations consequences when you cross the boss, even if that means simply making it difficult to make potential big money match-ups.

Or this is just a tactic, a way to help speed up the process in the hopes that Cyborg will decide it makes more sense to cut down to 135-pounds instead of continuing to insist Rousey comes up to the 145-pound weight class that doesn't even exist anymore, at least not under any Zuffa banner.

All we can do now is stay tuned.

                                                                                                                                                                                                               

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