Rich Franklin took a diplomatic stance leading into his fight with Wanderlei Silva, to take place in June, at UFC 99. Rather than provoke his opponent, the American fighter spoke well of the Brazilian, and went even further in telling Fighters Only Magazine he plans to train with Wand after their encounter.
“He had invited me to train at his gym in Las Vegas before this fight had been scheduled. I have enormous respect for Wanderlei Silva … I’m always in Vegas and intend to train at his academy after this fight. We’re great fighters but UFC wanted to make this fight …. [Silva] is very strong, fast and has knockout power in his hands. Everything I know it’s going to be a big fight. He has victories over Rampage in PRIDE and Jardine in UFC. He’s still hazardous as he was in PRIDE and is still exciting in action. I’m training my clinch, training hard to avoid his Muay Thai clinch. I’m training wrestling and Jiu-Jitsu as well and the rest of the aspects I have trained as I usually do to face other fighters,”said Franklin.
The bout between Wanderlei Silva and Rich Franklin will be held in Cologne, Germany, on June 13. Check out the official card:
Rich Franklin vs Wanderlei Silva
Heath Herring vs Cain Velasquez
Ben Saunders vs Mike Swick
Marcus Davis vs Dan Hardy
Spencer Fisher vs Caol Uno
PRELIMINARIES
Justin Buchholz vs Terry Etim
Dale Hartt vs Denis Siver
Peter Sobotta vs Paul Taylor
Roli Delgado vs Paul Kelly
Denis Stojnic vs Stefan Struve
Mustapha al Turk vs Todd Duffee
John Hathaway vs Rick Story
