Despite announcing his retirement, it appears Wanderlei Silva is ready to put his gloves back on.
The former PRIDE middleweight champion was a guest color commentator at Saturday night’s XFC International 7 in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and said that he would return to fight Chael Sonnen in an interview with RedeTV.
“Are you ready to do this? Let’s do this,” XFC president Myron Molotky asked Silva after the XFCi 7 main event, where Allan Nascimento defeated Ruslan Abiltarov via decision.
“If (Sonnen) accepts the fight, why not?” Silva replied. “I’d do it. Why not? I’m here. Come get it.”
Silva was originally scheduled to meet Sonnen in Brazil after the fighters coached The Ultimate Fighter‘s third season, but the match was pushed to UFC 175 because of Silva’s hand injury. From there, it was cancelled completely.
Silva announced his retirement on Sept. 19. A short time after his announcement, the MMA veteran received a lifetime ban by Nevada Athletic Commission for running away from a random drug test in his gym in Las Vegas.
Sonnen also retired from MMA after testing positive for five banned substances. The former middleweight and light heavyweight title contender later received a two-year suspension by NAC.
