There was a ton of mutual respect between Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson and Kevin Holland forward of their UFC Orlando headliner on Saturday. A lot respect that the 2 apparently had an settlement coming into the competition.
As Thomspon advised reporters through the post-fight scrum, he and Holland agreed to maintain the struggle standing.
“It was form of a type of unwritten guidelines we had going into this struggle. I do know afterward he was capturing, he had a busted hand, however I feel I fell down within the first spherical, and he let me again up,” he mentioned (quotes by MMA Preventing).
“He advised me within the first spherical, ‘I’m not taking you down.’ All proper, sounds good to me. It was form of a type of handshakes we had within the first spherical, no person was going to go down.”
Holland ultimately shot for takedowns in direction of the tip of the struggle due to a harm proper hand. However as Thompson continued to disclose, the struggle itself was a cordial affair all all through.
“He was telling me to decelerate, and I used to be telling him I’m sorry the whole time. “He was like, ‘You bought me good,’ I used to be like ‘I’m sorry, man!’ It was enjoyable. He’s hilarious.
“Every time we head-butted one another, he was like, ‘Oh man, I’m sorry,’ and I used to be like, ‘No, man, it’s OK, hold combating, hold combating,’ We had some enjoyable conversations in there.
“We wouldn’t have placed on a great present if it wasn’t for him as properly. I admire Kevin,” mentioned Thompson, who received by way of fourth-round TKO as a consequence of nook stoppage.
Thompson, who turns 40 in February, broke a two-fight skid with Saturday’s win, as he improves to a document of 17-6-1. Holland, in the meantime, is now on a two-fight skid, as he drops to a win-loss slate of 23-9 (with 1 NC). Each males took residence $50K for Battle of the Night time.
