UFC lightweight champion Ilia Topuria has suggested that he would be able to knock Terence Crawford out if the two ever faced each other in a crossover boxing match.

If there's one thing that Ilia Topuria isn't lacking, it's confidence - and understandably so. In his last three fights, he has been able to knock out Alexander Volkanovski, Max Holloway and Charles Oliveira. Of course, this is mixed martial arts we're talking about here, and it's a pretty different sport to professional boxing.

We all know that crossover boxing involving MMA fighters has become a pretty big deal in recent years, starting off with Conor McGregor's superfight against Floyd Mayweather. In the present day, Ilia Topuria is seen as the potential successor to Conor in terms of star power, and there are plenty of similarities.

One of the similarities is that Ilia Topuria believes he can beat one of the all-time boxing greats, as he noted in the following tweet.

Ilia Topuria backs himself to knock out Terence Crawford

“I won’t talk about what would happen between me and Crawford in an octagon I’ll talk about what would happen in a ring. I put him to sleep in the first contact !!”

Yes, this sounds outrageous, but Topuria has the kind of power that can help people believe just about anything that he says. Who knows, maybe at some point in the future we get the chance to see it - but first, Crawford has a meeting with Canelo Alvarez to focus on.