Brendan Allen believes he’ll have two distinct benefits in a possible conflict with middleweight champion Khamzat Chimaev.
‘All In’ scored the largest win of his combined martial arts profession at UFC Vancouver, forcing Reinier de Ridder to quit on his stool simply earlier than the fifth and ultimate spherical.
The victory moved Allen as much as the No. 5 spot within the middleweight rankings, probably placing him one large win away from his first crack on the division’s high prize.
“I feel our wrestling and jiu-jitsu can form of counteract one another and form of get rid of these two issues for us the place possibly he doesn’t need to wrestle as a lot,” Allen advised Submission Radio whereas discussing a possible conflict with Chimaev. “Um, after which it’s simply going to be hanging. And I feel that’s the place I beat him.
“I undoubtedly assume my endurance is best. I feel I’m greater than I’m making an attempt to assume. I’m in all probability greater than everybody that he’s fought. Possibly.”
Chimaev captured the 185-pound crown in August, handily defeating ex-titleholder Dricus Du Plessis at UFC 319. Since then, followers have been chomping on the bit to search out out who ‘Borz’ would defend his belt towards first.
Brendan Allen calls out ‘Quiet’ Dricus Du Plessis
The consensus seems to have landed on Nassourdine Imavov, who at the moment sits on a five-fight win streak, together with a vicious second-round knockout of Israel Adesanya and, most just lately, a unanimous choice W over Caio Borralho. ‘The Sniper’ additionally holds a victory over Allen, having bested ‘All In’ again in September 2024.
As for Allen, there are a number of choices for his subsequent opponent, chief amongst them being a long-awaited showdown with Du Plessis.
“Dricus all the time has one thing to say after I’m dropping as a result of he is aware of I’m an excellent powerful take a look at and I can in all probability beat him,” Allen advised MMA Junkie. “Obviously he’s a fighter, so he’s going to assume he’s going to beat me, however he is aware of it’s a troublesome take a look at. It’s straightforward to say after I’m dropping when you recognize you’re not going to struggle me subsequent, however now it’s like, it may occur. Once I was tremendous shut on an enormous win streak and it was a chance, he was tremendous quiet like a mouse in church.
“Now you don’t hear something from him, however what can you actually say now. He actually simply received dominated [by Chimaev]. Not a detailed struggle. Not had moments. None of that. You bought dominated for 25 minutes. I’ll be good and say you bought dominated for 23.5 minutes. What can you actually say? To me that’s an enormous phrase: Dominated. To me that’s a really large phrase. It carries numerous weight. Meaning you probably did nothing. You had nothing actually for the opposite man in any respect. That’s what occurred, and also you had been purported to be the champion and you bought dominated? That’s not purported to occur at that degree.”
