Movsar Evloev says the hijab condition for his Nina Drama interview was an attempt to get out of it, not a religious demand.
Evloev says he didn’t want to do the interview, so he set a condition he expected her to refuse. Nina Drama agreed, which left him with no way out.
“I wanted to refuse the interview, so I just set some conditions. I thought she’d refuse,” Evloev said, according to Adam Zubayraev, who shared the clip.
Evloev also pushed back on the idea that the interview earned him credit. “Does wearing a hijab for an hour suddenly make her a saint? Or do I get some kind of credit for it?” he said. He added that he is “just doing my own thing” and will be “running around in shorts like everyone else” tomorrow.
The comments land in the middle of a fight-week storm. Nina Drama (Nina-Marie Daniele) published the interview on her YouTube channel on October 21. Russian outlets reported that in it she asked Evloev if she was allowed to look at him, and he told her he couldn’t have looked at her had she not covered up.
The clip drew immediate backlash online. Some critics accused her of staging it for attention, and others said she shouldn’t have worn religious dress for an interview. Daniele answered on X, saying she wore the hijab out of respect and to make Evloev comfortable. She stressed that her interviews are voluntary and that nobody forced her to do anything. In her words, everything she does “is somehow always controversial.”
Evloev’s new remarks add a wrinkle to that account. His framing suggests the condition was a way to avoid the sit-down, and that Daniele called the bluff.
Evloev, 20-0 and the No. 1-ranked featherweight, has bigger things to worry about. He challenges Alexander Volkanovski for the UFC featherweight title in the main event of UFC 333 on Saturday, October 24, at Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi. The card also features Petr Yan defending his bantamweight belt against Merab Dvalishvili in a trilogy fight.
Evloev has never lost as a pro. He has also never finished a fight in the UFC, and he has said he wants his first stoppage in this one. Volkanovski, meanwhile, claims Evloev’s elite wrestling won’t be enough to dethrone him, and Evloev has already looked past the fight with a message for Arman Tsarukyan.
