UFC 248 - A Casual's perspective

UFC 248 happened at the weekend. I only saw the two main fights on the card. I heard that Neil Magny and Cowboy Olivera won. Indeed I saw the two cowboys, Oliveira and Cerrone greeting each other after Oliveira's fight when Cerrone was in the audience. The co-main event was the real main event in terms of entertainment. The two women gave it their all and it was a fitting fight for the eve of international women's day. The way I saw it, Zhang won the opening round but then Joanna found her range and capitalised on hitting the target with a head kick at the end of the second by coming out in the southpaw stance in the third. Joe Rogan pointed out in commentary that Joanna looked to be setting up for the left high kick in that stance. Zhang seemed wary of this and Joanna was teeing off with the jab and managing to find her range. She looked the more dominant in round three. A lot of the exchanges were fairly equal to me but it looked, despite her head ballooning from the fourth onwards, that Joanna was doing well enough to win the rounds. At first I thought Joanna did enough to shade round five but then I thought of how more visible her damage was and how Zhang came on strong towards the end of the fight so before the announcement I went from four rounds to one to a 48-47 score still in favour of Joanna. I was surprised by the split decision but not disappointed. I was going for Zhang going into the fight. I was thinking the fact that Zhang attempted takedowns probably helped her in the judges eyes as well. Looking at the stats, Zhang had way more head shots (as reflected by the damage she did) than joanna in the strikes. So I wasn't as observant because I didn't register enough of them, probably because it was such a fast paced fight. Great fight and I feel Zhang crossed a threshold in this and will be unphased by whatever opponents throw at her in future. I've heard experts say that Rose Namajunas can beat her because Rose is better at moving off at angles and managing distance.
What is there to say about the main event? The onus was on Yoel Romero to take the title from Israel Adesanya but he stood there and waited for opportunities for five rounds. Always waiting for the knockout. Israel took an early overhand to the eye and fought from distance after that. But that happened after the first two minutes of Yoel just standing and waiting. It wasn't a good fight but I don't think it was as bad as people made out. It was tense throughout and that gave it a sense of intrigue for me. Israel point fought from distance but I felt Yoel had the better opportunities for success on the rare occasion they presented themself. I initially agreed with the Weasle that Yoel should have won the fight but when I thought about it later and others mentioned Israel point fighting from distance, I changed my opinion to agree with the judges. Hopefully Khabib v Tony next month will live up to the hype.
In other news, Peter Queally has been announced in the main event at Bellator Dublin in October against Patricky Pitbull Friere. I was considering going to UFC Dublin in August but now I don't know. Bellator did a smart thing putting tickets on sale 20th of March and announcing the Main event. They have a number of Irish and Irish-based fighters to please the fans and if UFC can't put a big name in their event maybe people will wonder about attending at all because how many Irish have they fighting now other than Conor? Plus the last one was cancelled and moved to Liverpool to accommodate then rising star Darren Till. Who's to say they won't do the same with another rising star this time if Bellator sells well before the UFC ticket sales go ahead at the end of June? My only concern is I can't afford a Bellator ticket that soon after the previous event so all the good seats within my price range might be gone by the time I go to buy one. Now I'm asking myself why go to UFC Dublin at all if there's no big name and no decent irish fighters on the card.