Las Vegas — Undefeated featherweight Shane Collins made a successful debut at UFC Vegas 119, earning a unanimous decision victory over another newcomer in Otari Tanzilovi.
Collins (8-0) admits that it wasn’t the smoothest showing, what with Tanzilovi, a fighter he was well-acquainted with (they have some training partners and friends in common), holding his own.
“I feel good. Obviously that’s not the way you want to make your debut,” Collins told Cageside Press and other media outlets following the fight. “I always have the goal to go in there and try to be the best mixed martial artist I can and find the path of least resistance. Unfortunately for me the path of least resistance tonight was to get in his face and make it a bit dirty, which is not ideal but sometimes that’s what you’ve got to do.”
“It was a bit of an off night, couldn’t really find my timing or anything like that so I had to just bite down, and grit down and kind of own the moments that he wasn’t willing to own himself.”
Collins looked to defeat his opponent mentally, “and I feel like I did,” he added.
That said, while he’s not entirely thrilled with the performance, he did get the victory. And Shane Collins intends to keep getting those.
“It felt like kind of an off day, that’s fine with me. I got the victory, I’m here in the UFC now and the next time that they see me, you guys are going to see a completely different version of myself,” he stated backstage at the Meta Apex in Las Vegas. “But just know, whatever version of myself shows up, I’m still going to win, because that’s just what I do.”
Watch the full UFC Vegas 119 post-fight press conference with Shane Collins above.
