UFC 133 – Rich Franklin expecting a “potential war” with Antonio Rogerio Nogueira in Philadelphia

Former UFC middleweight champion, Rich Franklin has been giving his thoughts on his UFC 133 clash with Antonio Rogerio Nogueira on August 6^th in Philadelphia, explaining it’s has all the potential of a war written all over it as the Brazilian brother’s are notoriously difficult to put away.
Speaking via SI.com, Franklin said:

“I don’t know, I’ve never wanted to call fights or anything like that. I’ll say this much — I’m preparing for a stand up battle with him, but it really wouldn’t surprise me if for this camp he decided to take it to the ground. So really I’m kind of on my toes as to how this is going to end up being for this fight, I really don’t know. It’s going to be a tough fight for sure. The Nogueira brothers, these guys are definitely difficult to knock out for sure so I don’t see this being something that’s going to end in the first round. This has potential war written all over it.”

Franklin will be looking to get back to winning ways after coming up short against former 205 pound champion, Forrest Griffin at UFC 126 in February. Prior to that he’d knocked out another former champion in the form of Chuck Liddell. As for Nogueira, the Brazilian’s torrid time continued inside the octagon just last month when he came up short against rookie Phil Davis on the UFC on Versus 3 card. Prior to that he’d been smothered on route to a loss to Ryan Bader and squeaked past Jason Brilz via split decision.