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Alex Pereira lost his light heavyweight title of the UFC last Saturday in Las Vegas, with Magomed Ankalaev just winning a close decision of five towers to claim 205 pound gold during the main event of the UFC 313.
Unsurprisingly, Pereira coaches disagree with the dashboards.
Plinio Cruz and Glover Teixeira discussed the result on a video published Wednesday on Pereira YouTube pagesaying they saw their fighter superior to the first round, three and five. The three judges were unanimous by giving “Poatan” the advantage in the first, with a single judge marking the fifth in his favor. Ankalaev won the third round with a 10-9 score in each official dashboard.
“We had this defeat, but in my opinion, he won,” said Teixeira. “He lost on points, so now we go back to the drawing board and adjust a few things, we train hard and come back and get this revenge and make history. Poatan has already made the story before, and it will again make history. He is a great warrior and I am very proud of him.
Cruz echoes Teixeira and promised to help Pereira get back on the right track and recover the belt if it is given. In addition to that, Cruz saw the UFC 313 as a learning experience not only for the fighter, but the whole team.
“Life is made up of ups and downs, and these ups and downs are what makes us who are on this trip to our goal,” said Cruz. “We will come back stronger, will group together as a team. The atmosphere was great this week, we have no excuse. Poatan was fine and I think he won the fight. It is a trip, not a fall, and it will only make it stronger, our team stronger. Humans are evolving more during adversity.
“Rivalries make us grow. This happened this time, so we will train more, study more, improve, to deliver a better version of Poatan. More nasty. What this guy has done was aggravating the situation for him because he will now fight “Poatan 2.0”. It happened to Poatan before, it is not the first time, and a real champion is the one that stumbles but continues to move forward and reconstitute it. Poatan will reconquer the belt in the revenge match. A more average version. And our team will be at a level higher than it is already. »»
Pereira complained about Ankalaev’s strategy immediately after the fight, claiming that the judges should not reward a fighter who keeps his opponents for most of a tower, but has not yet looked at the fight to give his own reflections on the decision.
“Of course, this is not the result I wanted,” said Pereira. “We were confident for this fight, I was fine. I trained hard. Some things happen, of course, but I don’t want to give excuses. I know we will have the revenge match, we are already in talks – for all that I have done and the way the fight took place. Many people challenged (decision) and were in doubt. I have not yet looked at the fight, I will look to have my opinion, (because) it is difficult to have an idea when you are there. “”
