Merab Dvalishvili is the new bantamweight champion. After a dominant performance and a unanimous decision, the Georgian has dethroned Sean O’Malley from the bantamweight throne. The Machine was the better fighter through and through, as he proved why his wrestling would prove to be a threat to Suga. However, things weren’t as easy as during the fight, the usually calm Dvalishvili got into an argument with Tim Welch from O’Malley’s corner. Things reached the extent where referee Herb Dean had to interfere to make the Machine focus on the fight inside the Octagon instead. But what exactly happened?

Well, in the post-event press conference, Dvalishvili revealed that the reason he got into the spat was because Tim Welch was breaking the Georgian’s focus by constantly trash-talking. Something that, according to him, would usually not go unpunished in sports like basketball and soccer. So he lost his cool and took matters into his own hands instead, by arguing back-and-forth. However, he revealed that he did apologize to the referee for it.

He said, “Yeah, I was in, and I was fighting. I’m a professional fighter, you know; I’m focused. And it never happen to me, and I never pay attention to other corner. But Tim’s voice was very familiar because he was doing the same thing to AlJo; there is the clip, video out there on social media. Everybody, we saw that. He was doing same thing like he was doing very disrespectful way. “Merab, you gotta go.” He was talking shit on me, and I tell him stop it. And nobody was telling him to stop; he was just keep doing this, and if you do the same thing in basketball or soccer, they will do disqualification for you. But I guess he had not, and that’s why I was… I tell referee I’m sorry.”

The Machine lived up to the expectations fans had from him tonight. He easily kept on hitting takedowns and restricted the movement of O’Malley, thus lessening the morale and options of the American fighter at UFC 306. But how did the match turn into such a one-sided affair?

A seemingly underconfident O’Malley gets slayed

O’Malley truly looked underconfident getting into the Octagon. He knew the fighting style advantage Merab Dvalishvili had over him, as the wrestler could easily reduce the hitting force of the striker. Something that did end up materializing in the end! There was no trace of the champion’s mobility. Gone was that O’Malley who floated through the octagon. The Georgian kept taking down O’Malley and connected elbows, fists, and knees to the American’s thigh and liver area.

Suga constantly struggled to get into his opponent’s guard. He struggled throughout the match, except in the last round, where he did connect some good, powerful kicks. Something that had been missing from the frail punches throughout the other rounds. But by then it was too late, as Dvalishvili knew he had won, so he spent the entirety of the final round bouncing around the Octagon to survive the timer.

This surely was an underwhelming performance by Suga, who would now go back to the drawing board to see where he went wrong. But what do you think? What should’ve been Suga’s tactics? Let us know in the comments.

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