Under helgen som gick så utmanade Colby Covington welterviktsmästaren Kamaru Usman för dennes titel. Det gick dock inte hela vägen för honom då matchen bröts i slutskedet av den 5:e ronden och Usman tilldelades vinsten via knockout. Sedan dess har Covington kritiserat beslutet via sociala medier. Enligt ägaren av det gym Covington tränar på, American Top Team, vill Covington dock komma tillbaka och visa att han är bäst i världen.
I en intervju med MMAFighting valde ägaren, som heter Dan Lambert, att hylla Covington för dennes tuffhet för de ronder han gick med en skadad käke.
He came back to Florida to go see an oral surgeon here to figure out what he wanted to do. I’m not real familiar with what the different statuses are with the jaw but I know one thing, he’s a tough motherf*cker to fight with it for three rounds in that kind of stand-up war.
Lambert valde även att hylla matchen i sig som han anser gjorde mycket för bägge fighters.
It was a hell of a fight. Both those guys, I think both their stock went up after a fight like that, which is typically something you don’t say after a fight. Both guys proved they had balls of steel and cardio for days. I give credit to both of them.
Lambert håller delvis med Covington om att matchen bröts lite för tidigt men han tror inte att det skulle ändrat särskilt mycket då han inte tror att Covington skulle gått segrande ur ett domslut.
He wasn’t going to win the fifth round after getting dropped. The fight was even going into it so whoever won the fifth round was going to win the fight. So was it the greatest stoppage? Not really. It’s not like he was taking a bunch of damage but he wasn’t going to get the decision after it with the remaining 50 seconds unless something crazy happened. Can something crazy happen? I guess it can. The week before one of our other guys Jairzinho Rozenstruik got a knockout on Overeem with four seconds left. So anything can happen. Yeah, I think it was a little early but I don’t think it affected the decision. I know he was upset about it. No one wants to get the opportunity taken away from them. He was also upset about the “low blow” in the second round, I think that gave Usman a break, that didn’t really look low on the replay but sh*t like that happens in a fight.
Slutligen berättade Lambert att Covington i nuläget har för avsikt att kliva in i oktagonen så snart som möjligt och visa att han är bäst i världen.
He is a 10 out of 10 as far as what I would hope his mindset would be after a fight like that. He wants to get right back in. He wants to get right back into training. He wants to get back into training as soon as he’s ready health wise. He wants to get back and prove that he’s the best. You never know how a fighter’s going to respond to something like that. When I first talked to him, I had my concerns cause you just never know. I could not have scripted his response any better than what I heard from him. He’s 1,000 percent positive, 1,000 percent motivated. He’s ready to go. He didn’t lose one piece of confidence in himself.
Usman och Covington möttes i huvudmatchen på UFC 245 som ägde rum den 15:e december i Las Vegas, USA.
