Exclusive | Matthew Bonner Eyes Future UFC Move, Welcomes Debut Against Ian Garry: ‘He’s Beatable’

Former Cage Warriors middleweight champion, Matthew Bonner has plans to eventually make the proven transition from the Graham Boylan-led promotion to the UFC in the future – and if he could pick a debut opponent, a matchup against former Cage Warriors titleholder, Ian Garry certainly piques his interest. 

Matthew Bonner, who plys his trade at Next Generation MMA in Liverpool, boasts a 12-7-1 professional record, and managed to land his second consecutive victory back at Cage Warriors 137 earlier this month, submitting Joel Kouadja with a stunning one-armed rear-naked choke win.

Clinching the middleweight title back in June of last year, Bonner submitted Nathias Frederick with a fourth round stoppage, however, would drop his title in his next outing against Djati Melan. 

Prior to his win against Kouadja, Bonner had returned to the winner’s enclosure with another career submission win – rebounding with a rear-naked choke triumph against Hugo Pereira.

Matthew Bonner welcomes a UFC bow against Cage Warriors alum Ian Garry

Discussing a potential move to the UFC in the future, Bonner told LowKick MMA reporter, Frank Bonada during an interview how a debut Octagon outing against Dublin upstart, Garry is something that interests him.

“I would love to fight Ian Garry, I would love to fight Ian Garry,” Matthew Bonner said. “I just think he brings a lot of attention to the fight, and you’ll bring a lot of fans, because of that. He drills up a lot of attention, you know. People know who he is, he’s an undefeated prospect.”

“I do think he’s very beatable as well,” Matthew Bonner said. “I still think he’s quite – he looks quite young in the game, he’s quite naive I think in some respect. His mouth is on point, but I don’t think his skills are just, quite there yet. I do think my style, in terms of being tough, being durable and just walking somebody down, would just cause him an awful lot of problems. I’ve only spoken to him very briefly once, and that was when I beat his teammate, James Webb at the time. … I don’t dislike the guy, but I’d love to fight Ian Garry. I think that would tick a lot of boxes for me fighting him.”

Undefeated as a professional, Garry, who now plys his trade at Sanford MMA in Deerfield Beach, Florida at Sanford MMA – stopped Jordan Williams in his UFC bow back in November at Madison Square Garden, before defeating Darian Weeks with a unanimous decision victory at UFC 273 in the ‘Sunshine State’ in April.