Fernando Gonzalez and Michael Page were booked to meet each other in London, England on July 16 at Bellator 157, but the fight has been scratched following visa issues for Gonzalez.
The news of Gonzalez being out of the fight was initially reported by MMA Junkie on early Wednesday afternoon and a Bellator official confirmed to The MMA Report that “visa issues prevented Gonzalez from fighting in London.”
When the initial story was released by MMA Junkie, the story cited undisclosed reasons in why Gonzalez was out of the fight. The mixed martial arts community began to speculate on why Gonzalez was out of the fight and in a phone interview with The MMA Report, Gonzalez confirmed that he is not injury and is just going with the flow.
“About a week or two ago, they just called me up and informed me that they were getting all of my paperwork together for my visa,” Gonzalez told The MMA Report. “Things in the past that had happened, but everything is expunged off my record for three or four years now. But obviously, you have to let them know. We let them know and they came back to me and said I would not possibly get in because of those problems. And I said well that is strange. There are people that get into the country with bad things like felonies and everything has been expunged off my record. There is absolutely nothing on my record now. So it seemed kind of weird to me when they told me that but I was like ‘ok, I will go with it and see what’s going to happen.’ They just got back to me and let me know that the chances of me fighting out there were not going to happen.”
“They were going to get back to me and let me know what we are going to do and when I would be fighting next,” he continued. So right after this last show in Boise, [Bellator] did not say too much about the fight, but said we were going to sit down and talk. Possibly look like a title shot down the line in October after [Andrey] Koreshkov heels up from some injuries. He did not really say as to why the fight was — I know it wasn’t one my end. I even actually had a lawyer look into it to be safe and he said with everything being expunged, it should not be a problem to get me into the country with my visa. He said, if you don’t want to argue with it, that is up to you. If not, just let it be and go with the flow. That is kind of what I have been doing. I am not injured at all. I am ready to go. I do not want anyone thinking that. For me, I am just going to go with whatever they want and hopefully I get that title shot in October.”
This is the second time that Bellator has attempted to book Gonzalez against Page. Initially, Bellator had booked the two welterweights to meet at Bellator 151 in March. However, Page pulled out of the event due to undisclosed reasons and Gonzalez ended up defeating Gilbert Smith by split decision. With this being the second time this fight has been scratched, is Gonzalez frustrated that the fight with Page is not taking place in July?
“To be honest, it does get a little frustrating but it’s something that I have dealt with in the past,” Gonzalez said. “They are saying that he is not afraid of me and who am I. I am 25-13. The thing is, those are a lot of numbers. He is 10-0, 9-0 or something like that. I have more losses than he has wins. Just in the losses, you gain more experience. The thing is that I think it messes with him a little bit is that I have that much experience but they also haven’t put the backing behind me. He knows he is going to have a tough fight. He is taking more of a risk fighting me than just waiting for me to probably just get the title and it gives him a reason to fight me for the belt.”
When things like this happen in combat sports, fighters like to start thinking about what could be next. For Gonzalez, his mentality is that he will be fighting Andrey Koreshkov for the Bellator welterweight title next and only time will tell if this is next for Gonzalez.