Paris, France – It’s was all on the line at UFC Paris for two middleweights needing a big win as Alessio Di Chirico and Roman Kopylov met in the octagon on Saturday night.
Di Chirico (13-6) was coming off a KO loss to Abdul Razak Alhassan in Aug 2021. He was 1-4 in his last 5 bouts which put him on the short list of possible cuts after UFC Paris.
Kopylov (8-2) hadn’t managed a win in his two UFC outings taking losses to Karl Roberson and Albert Duraev respectively.
With the fight, and possibly a roster spot, on the line at UFC Paris it was expected that both men would leave it all in the cage inside Accor Arena.
Round 1 lot of pressure off the bat from Kopylov forcing Di Chirico to attack off the back foot which is not ideal. Kopylov continued to put the pressure on Di Chirico through leg kicks like it was nothing. One of the few times Di Chirico could actually move forward was when Kopylvo missed a high kick and fell.
Kopylov’s kicks left dents in his opponent whenever he landed them. Kopylov clearly had the speed advantage in this one early using that quickness to land on Di Chirico with jabs, left hands and kicks. A flying knee from Kopylov was caught by Di Chirico but he was unable to do much with it as the round ended.
Round 2 was more of the same to begin except Di Chirico began to look to put some pressure of his own on his opponent, but after a quick flurry he went back to his counter striking ways. Di Chirico began to chase Kopylov quite a bit looking to land on his opponent. He looked for takedowns, but Kopylov’s defense was solid. Both men began to slow down quite a bit with a minute left in the round, but that’s when Di Chirico turned it on to try and take the round. Kopylov was now the one fighting off the back foot.
Round 3 Kopylov clearly wasn’t sure about round two so he put the pressure back on Di Chirico who was more than happy to let his strikes go. Combos, up elbows, kicks, Di Chirico was looking for something to finish the fight with.
Suddenly Kopylov put a combination on Di Chirico that dropped the Italian fighter and finished the fight.
Official Result: Roman Kopylov def. Alessio Di Chirico via R3 1:09 KO
