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Aljamain Sterling is not taking Youssef Zalal lightly. Former champion Sterling (20-5 MMA, 17-5 UFC) meets streaking featherweight Zalal (18-5-1 MMA, 8-3-1 UFC) in the UFC Fight Night 274 main event on April 25 at the Meta APEX ( Paramount+ ). Sterling and Zalal share mutual respect after having trained together on multiple occasions.
"I think it's a fantastic matchup," Sterling said of Zalal on his YouTube channel . "He's high level. I think he's one of the harder guys to beat in the division, if I'm being 100 percent honest.
"You look at a guy like Movsar (Evloev), you look at a guy like Zalal. He can move his feet a lot better than a lot of these guys. He's hard to hit.
I think when it comes to the two of us, both of us do a good job of avoiding damage and being able to damage, and that's the name of our game. ... We're on the same page: We like to fight pretty.
"I think that's going to be the difference in this: who wants to take that leap and cross that line and change up their style to get to the other guy? That's what's going to make it such a high-level chess match. He's got a fantastic jab – I know this first hand from training.