“I made no eye contact with O’Malley’s team. But when the fight started, I hear his team calling out to me, ‘Merab!’ Trying to coach, provoke, and distract me. I yelled back at them cut it out and coach your own guy.” Merab Dvalishvili expressed his rage right after he defeated Sean O’Malley at UFC 306. Well, ‘The Machine’ did receive a warning from Herb Dean when he reacted to Tim Welch’s callouts. Needless to say, the Georgian was visibly upset about it. But do you know what O’Malley’s coach thought about it? 

During the recent episode of The Ariel Helwani Show, the famed MMA reporter weighed in on how Welch got under Dvalishvili’s skin at the Sphere. He wondered if Welch was going to repeat that at UFC 316. In turn, the coach put a scenario in front of Helwani. He asked what the reporter would do if he knew that a couple of his words had the potential to push his opponent’s team to make some mistakes. Helwani admitted that it wasn’t the wrong thing to do. In fact, many others have also done the same. However, the fact remained clear that Welch’s words bothered Dvalishvili. 

Welch said, “Yeah, it’s definitely not a new trick, because I’ve been in fights, the other coaches talking to me. Definitely, you hear it, you hear it. It goes through your mind. So, I guess there’s a rule, there’s a rule, I think John McCarthy said it’s excessive coaching. I still have yet to see this rule. And then again, you see the videos, and I said, ‘Merab, you need to be patient.’ And now, you said, ‘Big’ John says you can’t even say the other fighter’s name. If you say the other name, then that’s not…” Of course, there was a catch. One simply should not continue to shout throughout the bout. Just a couple of words here and there were enough as per Welch. 

When Helwani questioned if Suga’s team had any mind games planned for the fight week, Welch refused it all. According to him, a scuffle right before the fight could put it in jeopardy. And there was no way either team was willing to do that. It was at that moment that Helwani pointed out the jacuzzi scene. Following the battle at Noche UFC, Dvalishvili and O’Malley were spotted enjoying the PI jacuzzi. But Welch was not there. 

Helwani even claimed that Dvalishvili was yet to bury the hatchet with Welch, even though all was well with ‘Suga’. Weighing in on this, the coach said, “I don’t know why! I mean, people call me a carrot top redhead all the time. And I don’t really take it to heart, that’s what I am. And I think he got upset about the nose comment a while ago. I mean, the truth hurts sometimes.”

We now know Welch’s perspective regarding the act at UFC 306. Meanwhile, the bantamweight champion claimed that it was nothing but unsportsmanlike behavior. But do you know what Dvalishvili’s coach at Syndicate MMA, John Wood, had to say about it? 

What does Merab Dvalishvili’s coach have to say about the shouts from Sean O’Malley’s teammate?

During a conversation with MMA Fighting back in 2024, Wood revealed that talking trash to fighters was not the coach’s job. No doubt, he believed that Welch’s move wasn’t appreciable at all. He said, “I’m not trashing Tim for anything he does. I respect Tim, but it is a bull—t move. I was yelling at Tim across the cage several times when Sean would mess up, and I was making sure Sean heard me calling out everything that he wanted to throw. When he would do something stupid, I caught myself a couple of times in the fight going, ‘Tim, did you teach him that? That was terrible!’ [shouting] across the cage.”

Wood was adamant in his take about the coaches’ role in fighters’ trash talks. He expressed his disappointment at Welch talking badly about Dvalishvili before the fight on camera. In the end, he pointed out that maybe it was the only thing they could do to get the mental edge. After all, according to Wood, O’Malley was pretty fragile at UFC 306. 

On top of that, Wood had to reel Dvalishvili in and explain that Welch’s words didn’t matter. He continued to shower all hell upon the opponent’s coach. The Syndicate MMA coach believed that Welch wasn’t doing a good job of training O’Malley. Had he done the same, he wouldn’t have had to rely on trash talk during the fight. But is there a change in the game plan for Team O’Malley? Guess we’ll have to wait and watch. 

What are your thoughts on Welch badmouthing Dvalishvili at UFC 306? Do you think it should be made an illegal move like John McCarthy claimed? Let us know what you think in the comments down below.