Sean O’Malley Praises His Opponent Ahead Of UFC 316: “Merab’s An Animal, He’s A Beast.”
UFC 316 fight week is here.
O’Malley vs. Dvalishvili 2
UFC 316 is Saturday, June 7 live from Newark, New Jersey. The headliner is a rematch for the UFC Batamweight Championship between the reigning champion, Merab Dvalishvili and the former champion, Sean O’Malley.
The two originally main evented Noche UFC, UFC’s first event in the Sphere arena. O’Malley walked in as champion that night, but did not walk out the same way. O’Malley did walk in with a labrum tear in his hip, that he did get fixed following that loss. Merab on the other hand, went on to successfully defend his title for the first time against the then undefeated Umar Nurmagomedov at UFC 311. Now, five months later, Merab is defending again against Sean in the highly-anticipated rematch.
Recently, O’Malley sat down for an interview with UFC commentator, Jon Anik. During the interview, Sean was asked what he thought of Merab’s defense against Umar, to which he admitted Merab is a beast.
Merab’s an animal, he’d a beast. He’s a- that last performance was very impressive, it was his most entertaining performance and yeah, he did a great job. Umar’s really good and Merab, it was a close fight, Merab kind of, you know, stole it there at the end.
O’Malley continued on to speak about his confidence and how he feels he can beat Merab and will show it Saturday night.
Yeah, I mean, I wouldn’t have… I wouldn’t accept the fight, I wouldn’t have asked for the fight if I didn’t truly believe I could go out there and beat him, I know I can. And I know I will June 7th.
When asked if he was emotionally attached to his first real loss when defeated by Dvalishvili in the first fight, Sean reveals that he now sees this as a new challenge.
I look at it as it’s an exciting challenge. Like, it’s not like something that bothers me throughout the day or like, if this fight ended up not happening ever, it’s not going to bug me. I know I’m better than him. I’m very grateful for the UFC for giving me the opportunity to go out there and fight him again. Same with the Chito thing, it took me three and a half years, I knew I could beat him. I knew there would be a time and a place and that happened. Felt very similar for this fight, I’m like “it’s going to happen sooner or later.” And it’s happening sooner and in very happy with that.
O’Malley seems to be very focused and confident in his abilities when the cage door locks. We’ll see what happens this Saturday night. You can check out the full interview below.
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