Former heavyweight champion Junior dos Santos won’t let his next opponent’s trash talk get under his skin ahead of their meeting on the Saturday night. Paired up against heavy-hitter Derrick Lewis for UFC Wichita’s main event, ‘Cigano’ believes he’ll have his chance to shut the ‘Black Beast’ up in the Octagon.

Although ‘JDS’ emphasizes how dangerous Lewis’ hands and knockout power are, the former champion told Combate that Derrick also possesses many gaps in his game that could be exploited.

“He’s very strong, he has amazing knockout power. Technically, though, he is not that much, He makes mistakes in some areas. You need to be very careful, all the time. He likes to talk too much, he’s a controversial guy. No matter what he has to say, though, he’s about to taste some of this.” Junior said, while pointing to his closed fist.

With a TKO win over prospect Tai Tuivasa in his last outing, December 2018 and an unanimous decision victory over Blagoy Ivanov before that, Cigano believes to already be in the title mix, but feels like he still needs some more good performances in order to secure another shot.

“I’m already qualified to fight for the belt, I just need to beat whoever is ahead of me in the rankings. With one or two more wins, I think I should be fighting for the title again. I want to face the best, the best of the best. I think this could be a great opportunity, Lewis is well ranked and a win over him puts me in a good spot.”

Junior dos Santos is expected to take on Derrick Lewis at UFC Fight Night 146’s main event, The card will take place on March 9, in Wichita, Kansas.