‘Can’t wait to see her response’: Colby Covington makes crude claims about fellow UFC star Polyana Viana

Colby Covington issued some coarse comments when he was asked why he didn't step in to face Leon Edwards in Saturday's UFC headliner, claiming he had been romancing fellow fighter Polyana Viana despite her claims to the contrary.

Long considered to be one of the UFC's most outspoken trash-talkers, Covington's mouth may have got him in some hot water with fight queen Viana days after she took to social media to clarify their relationship as being "just friends" after a picture of the two embracing on the training mats swirled around social media in recent days and sparked relationship rumors between the pair.

However, despite Viana's clarification, Covington doubled-down on the Twitter speculation to - somewhat crudely - detail exactly why he wasn't available to fight last weekend, and only part of it is down to the money he was offered to take the Edwards fight on short notice.

"There wasn't much talks, you know?," Covington told Australian outlet Submission Radio of his reticence to face the Jamaican-born Brit.

"I was b*lls deep in Polyana Viana, so get me off the couch in three weeks notice to fight some Leon Scott [Edwards] guy. You know, it was going to be a price tag. I wanted a little bit more than was in my contract, I just wasn't gonna show up for a normal paycheck to fight that guy. The way I fight guys, I redline it every time I fight."

Covington came up short in his maiden UFC title opportunity against Kamaru Usman in late 2019 and has since been campaigning for a rematch with his heated rival, but with a sole win against a shop-worn Tyron Woodley his only body of work since losing to Usman by late TKO, most analysts suggest that a win against surging Contender Edwards would breathe new life into Covington's world title ambitions.

But, for now at least, Covington said he was willing to wait for a better opportunity and says that his time was better spent with the 16-4 Brazilian flyweight Viana, despite her rubbishing the pair's relationship rumors.

"So when I fight you know you're getting a Ferrari that's coming forward, high octane, high energy, and he's coming to fight and bring the fight," Covington explained.

"So if I want to fight at my best, I need a full training camp. That fight was never gonna happen unless the UFC was gonna pay for it to happen because like I said before, I was with Polyana Viana. I got better things to do than show up on some irrelevant card against some irrelevant guy named Leon [Edwards]."

Viana has yet to comment on Covington's crude comments but fight fans are predicting that the 28-year-old won't be best pleased when she sees them.

"Polyana Viana gonna be mad when she sees this lmao," wrote one fan, while another said that he "can't wait to see her response" to Covington's X-rated statement - given that she said she "already has a boyfriend" when the Covington speculation arose. 

But perhaps we shouldn't expect too much from a fighter who frequently boasts of how his "bedroom cardio" helps prepare him for top-level fights - just not last weekend, apparently.