Thug Rose ‘Medically Cleared For Combat’

Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC

‘Thug Rose’ may be returning to the cage soon for her highly anticipated shot against strawweight champ Weili Zhang.

We haven’t heard a lot from women’s strawweight contender Rose Namajunas since her gutsy split decision defeat of Jessica Andrade at UFC 251, but that’s not exactly unusual. Namajunas is one of the more reclusive stars of the sport and it’s not unlike her to completely disappear off the map in between fights.

But a blip of activity on her Instagram account suggests she’s about to return for another fight.

Leading up to UFC 254, UFC president Dana White gave us something of an update on Namajunas.

“She’ll be coming back in early 2021,” he told Yahoo! Sports. “Rose has some surgery after her last fight, so it’s going to depend on how she’s healing.”

In a new video collage of Rose back in the gym and training hard, Namajunas declares herself #MedicallyClearedToFight with the caption “Nose is ready.”

Namajunas had suffered a broken nose in the third round of her fight with Andrade which needed surgery to fix. Three months later, and it sounds like the doctors have given her to go ahead to get punched in the face again.

Her next opponent? White confirmed it was most likely women’s strawweight champion Weili Zhang. Zhang hasn’t competed since a 5 round fight of the year contender with former champ Joanna Jedrzejczyk back in March.

With no quit in either Namajunas or Zhang, a title bout between the two sounds like a can’t miss affair. We’ll keep you posted with any updates on a date.