Bless express back on track, Arnold Allen is for real

One man silenced the critics and made it clear that he’s far from done, whilst his opponent showed he belongs amongst the elite at 145lbs

I will preface this by saying that I didn’t look forward to this fight, but only because it meant one of the fighters had to lose. From a rankings perspective, this fight made total sense, and for Arnold Allen it was a huge opportunity to establish himself as the clear number one contender after the unification bout between Alexander Volkanovski and Yair Rodriguez which is set to take place in July. For Holloway however, this was a chance to get back on track after the trilogy loss to Volkanovski, but it wasn’t gonna be an easy task. That being said though, the champion is the only man to have beaten Holloway at 145 since Conor McGregor did so a decade ago. Allen faced an uphill battle for sure, but he showed that although he didn’t have enough for Holloway on the day, he definitely belongs at the top of the division.

Watching the fight in real time I scored the fight 48-47 in favour of Arnold Allen, but watching it back I will acknowledge that I was probably a bit blinded by bias. Don’t get me wrong, I am a huge fan of Holloway, but I also think Allen winning would’ve been an interesting shake up in the division as Holloway has already lost to the champ three times. Watching the fight back though, it’s pretty clear to me that Holloway won, either 3 rounds to 2 or 4 rounds to 1. I don’t think it was a dominating performance from Holloway akin to the ones against Calvin Kattar or Brian Ortega, but he did enough to get his hand raised. Allen can absolutely keep his head held high even in defeat though, because keeping up with Holloway is not something a lot of fighters have been able to do. His cardio was impressive, especially as we hadn’t seen him go five rounds before, and he was able to push Holloway back at times and not let him get in his flow state which has crumbled many opponents in the past. And when he needed a finish in the fifth, he really went for broke. And yes, Holloway did drop him at the last second when Allen got a bit reckless, but that was a last ditch attempt to get a finish and not how he usually fights.

But this all begs the question, what’s next? It will take a lot for the UFC to give Holloway a fourth shot at Volkanovski, so his best path back to the title will probably be if Yair Rodriguez becomes champion next. Seeing as Volk has been such a dominant force since he became champ there’s no doubt he will get an immediate rematch if he were to lose the belt, so Rodriguez will in all likelihood have to beat him twice before facing new challengers. Holloway does have a win over Rodriguez, so there’s absolutely a narrative there, but if he doesn’t want to sit out (which I can’t imagine he will) there are a few fun matchups for him. The Korean Zombie is ranked at #6 and is someone who has talked about wanting to fight Holloway in the past, so that is one possibility. Taking a fight at 155 is another, but if it’s a one off while waiting for a featherweight title shot I’m not quite sure what matchup would make sense there.

For Allen, the obvious next step should be the London card in the summer. As long as he didn’t sustain any injuries that should be realistic, and a matchup with Brian Ortega could make sense. Most of the other fighters around him are either matched up or recovering from injuries, and he shouldn’t have fight as far down as the 8-10 range. That leaves either Korean Zombie or Brian Ortega, and of those were to be matched up with Holloway and Allen, it makes more sense for Holloway to face The Korean Zombie and Allen to face Ortega in my opinion. Whether that main events UFC London or not probably depends on who Tom Aspinall takes on in his comeback fight, but those two would be the main and co-main event for sure.

Even though I didn’t want any of them to lose, I loved everything about this fight. The respect between the both of them was great to see both before, during and after the fight, and it shows that you don’t need to fabricate beef no matter what. The fight in itself was awesome, a perfect mix between a slow chess match with some wild flurries sprinkled in. And even though I wanted Allen to get it done, I’m also psyched to see that Holloway is still that guy, and he seems as hungry as ever. I have no doubt that Arnold Allen will fight for (and has a good chance to win) a UFC title one day. He is still a young man who will continue to get better, and it wouldn’t shock me if this fight was ran back sometime in the future with a piece of gold on the line.