By CHRISTOS POLYDOROU
MMANEWS.COM GUEST CONTRIBUTOR

Undisputed Middleweight trash-talking champ Chael Sonnen, renowned for his no-holds-barred verbal arsenal, has recently thrown down the gauntlet challenging yet another UFC fighter of Brazilian inheritance. The once UFC Middleweight contender has chosen to redirect his attention from Wanderlei Silva to the former UFC Light-heavyweight champion Lyoto Machida.

After the dust had settled following the Silva/Leben fight at UFC 132, Sonnen gave an interview to MMAFighting and unleashed yet again his relentless fury, both comical and serious in intent as is the middleweight’s style:

"The only guy that would have finished him quicker is me," said Sonnen in a comment directed to Wanderlei Silva who had just fallen at the hard uppercuts of Chris Leben.

In reply to whether he still considered a possible future match-up against Wanderlei, Sonnen replied: "No, it doesn't make sense, no. Wanderlei's gonna need to do something else. I don't have any interest in getting in there with him. I don't want to be the next guy to force him to have a flashlight shined in his eyes."

Sonnen, who has not seen any in-ring action since his title fight loss to Middleweight champion Anderson Silva on August 7, 2010, has recently had his suspension lifted by the California State Athletic Commission and is eligible to reapply for his fight licence. For all the fight fans that have not been following Sonnen’s recent court drama, the story follows as thus: Soon after the Silva/Sonnen title fight, it was reported that Sonnen had tested positive for elevated levels of testosterone. He was consequently penalized with a year-long suspension by the California State Athletic Commission, which was later reduced to 6 months. Sonnen, who parallel to his fighting career was also actively involved in politics running for State Representative in Oregon's House District 37, dropped out of the race after being charged of money laundering. The fighter pleaded guilty to the money laundering charges on January 3, 2011, and was sentenced to 2 years of probation and taxed with a $10,000 fine.

Love him or (as the booing may hint at) hate him, Sonnen has managed to stay in the spotlight even after the fighter had failed to pound away his way to the top of the Middleweight food chain. Using his Tweeter account as the weapon of choice, Sonnen has attacked, challenged and satirized a multitude of fighters, particularly Brazilians. In the aforementioned interview during UFC 132, Chael made public his desire to take a shot at 205 pounder Lyoto Machida: "I don't know what the future holds, there are plenty of guys out there to fight. There's a karate guy at 205 pounds, I might stop there on my way back to 185 for a tuneup fight and take out Machida."