On December 29 at OKTAGON 65, Will Fleury will challenge the Czech superstar Karlos Vémola for the light heavyweight title.
In the build-up to this massive moment in his career, the Irishman has had his expectations and mindset go through some changes.
Fleury was assuming that he would be faced with a hostile Vémola but their face-to-face encounter in the build-up to the fight didn't pan out this way.
Instead, the champion was in high spirits as the two men joked back and forth and showed a lot of mutual respect towards one another.
The challenger has not had positive experiences with his next opponent in the past following a training session between them that resulted in Fleury suffering an injury.
In an interview with Fighters Only, he spoke about how Vémola surprised him with his conduct before they step inside the O2 Arena in Prague:
"He came across as a bit of a d***head back then. He would have been one of the guys that like yeah, he's a proper f****** muppet like and now, just dealing with him backstage and whatever, it just seems like... he's grand. It's not like I'm not gonna knock the s*** out of him because he's a grand fella but he doesn't seem like a complete f****** a**hole. He doesn't seem like a piece of s*** human being. He's not someone that I have like a massive 'f*** you' agenda with but at the same time, you're in my way, you've got that title, you're the guy, I want to f****** smash you."
Fleury gave a lot of credit to Vémola for taking this dangerous fight when he didn't necessarily need to with the champion stating that this is about him proving once and for all that he has never ducked any opponent.
For the challenger, who has won back-to-back fights via finish since arriving in OKTAGON, he spoke in the face-to-face interview about this match-up being about validation.
However, he has slightly changed his stance since then after coming to a realisation about his career goals and motivation.
Fleury still believes that a win on December 29 will see him earn the respect that he believes he has deserved for a long time but that's not his main focus.
Becoming the light heavyweight champion in a promotion like OKTAGON is an accomplishment that he wants for himself, not so that he can receive the long overdue praise.
"Beating Karlos, it's a big step in that direction but to me it's like look, man, I've been able to do this for so long and I've been able to fight at a high level for so long. It's like you owe it to yourself to actually make that unquestionable and it's very enjoyable. I've been very p***** off over the years with how little credit I've been given for how good I am but then, once you get a little bit of an ego boost, it's like I don't need it. I do it for me."
