It was dubbed the biggest fight in the history of UFC but did it deliver?
Oh Hell Yeah!
McGregor came with a game plan and executed it to perfection, on the other hand Diaz’s game plan didn’t.
We saw the hint of things to come from the very first fight of the night between the fighters representing the two rival camps, Artem Lobov and Chris Avila.
Avila, who has molded his style on his icon Diaz, saw his opponent came with a specific strategy of leg kicks. The fight went to the distance and Lobov won by a unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27).
This was a clear indication of things to come from “The Notorious”.
We all saw what happened to him at UFC 196. He was fighting against a much bigger man and his power and stamina were lacking big time, not to mention the disadvantage he had in the ground game, in which Diaz is considered a Master.
Something had to change for the rematch!
So McGregor did exactly what he had to do to beat Diaz. First, he eliminated takedowns or getting involved on the ground with Diaz. Secondly, he managed to preserve his stamina to perfection. Clear indication was, when we saw McGregor running away from Diaz to catch his breath for which he was heavily criticized by Diaz in the post-fight comments.
The few times when we saw Diaz tried to take the Irishman down, the Champ showed great defensive technique to avoided takedown.
At the end the judges gave the fight to McGregor in a majority decision (48-47, 47-47, 48-47).
Later, Diaz also admitted his game plan failed and that he should have focused more on striking rather than trying to take McGregor to the ground.
He said: “I felt like I was going for a takedown a bit too much, but I felt like maybe I should have focused on punching more.”
All this leads us to McGregor-Diaz Trilogy, this could happen in a year or so, but what we know for sure is, it will be at McGregor’s weight advantage of 155 pounds.
