Alexander Gustafsson feels Jon Jones was able to neutralize him early in their rematch.
Gustafsson and Jones competed for the vacant Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) light heavyweight gold last night (Dec. 29). The bout served as UFC 232’s main event. While their first encounter back in Sept. 2013 was an instant classic, Jones pretty much had his way the second go-around. “Bones” scored a third-round knockout victory.
Gustafsson Talks Second Loss To Jones
During the UFC 232 post-fight press conference, Gustafsson talked about how effective Jones was at neutralizing him (via MMAFighting.com):
“I just hurt my groin in there, and Jon, he knew exactly what to do to stop my footwork and stop my movement and my flow, my distance. So he just made sure I couldn’t move anymore. That was it. He took me down and I couldn’t get up. He got me very, very early in the first round, very early, and after that I just shut down. I wasn’t tired. I had my conditioning, I felt good. I felt good, and we had our exchanges and everything, but he just shut me down very early in the first round and that was it, and I couldn’t move at all.
“I wanted to move. I wanted to stay light, move around like I always do basically, but after that first exchange, I just couldn’t follow up my gameplan. And then I was more in his distance and I was working on my boxing there, but he moved around and I couldn’t really follow his movement. I fought his game today.”
Where do you think Alexander Gustafsson goes from here?
