Sydney, Australia — Australian lightweight Tom Nolan played the Grinch to Viacheslav Borshchev’s “Slava Claus” at UFC 312 over the weekend, and found himself having fun in the fight.
Which is apparently why he didn’t grapple as much as he originally anticipated, he told media outlets including Cageside Press following the bout, which saw him win a unanimous decision.
“I expected myself to grapple a little bit more, but when I was in there I just felt very comfortable on the feet,” said Nolan (9-1). “I changed a few things up with my weight cut, so I was confident in my ability to take damage, to give damage, to not get tired, and most importantly I just had fun, so when I’m having fun I like to strike.”
Nolan did show a bit of his grappling skills, however, and that might have caught Borshchev by surprise. “I just expected him to expect me to only strike. I think everyone thinks I’ll only strike, because I’ve only shown my striking. So it’s to be expected,” said Nolan, later explaining that he’d held back on his grappling in UFC fights thus far.
“I’ve said I want to keep it up my sleeve for the right fight. This wasn’t necessarily that fight in the sense of just taking him down, looking for the sub only, but it was a good opportunity to mix it up. And I think I did it at the right time.”
Tom Nolan later explained that he carries a healthy does of fear with him into his fights. It’s less about being scared of opponents, however, and more about respecting their skills.
“I wouldn’t say scared, but I always have a healthy amount of fear and respect for my opponents. I know what can happen,” he explained. “For him [Borshchev], there was a little bit of an extra touch obviously, for who he is and what he’s done. Skill for skill, I know why the UFC put this fight together. Like Dana [White] said it on that video, it’s two strikers going to punch the sh*t out of each other. So it’s like, one of us is probably going to drop, I hope it’s not me.”
Thanks to Nolan changing his weight cut, including sweating off weight for the first time since he was 19 rather than strictly dieting down, it wasn’t him who dropped.
Watch the full UFC 312 post-fight appearance by Tom Nolan above.
