Tom Aspinall is not a happy man following his UFC 321 title defense that ended in a “No Contest.”
It’s been a long road back into the cage for Aspinall, only to have his first undisputed title defense waved
off after four minutes due to a nasty double eye poke from opponent Ciryl Gane. What’s worse, everyone seems to be blaming him for being unable to fight after the poke.
For someone so good at fighting, Tom can’t seem to catch a break.
In a new video, Aspinall’s father and coach Andy revealed that Tom still can’t see at all from one eye and the other was at 50% vision. The UFC heavyweight champion also sounds like he’s pissed off at how things have gone over the past year and a half.
“He’s just in a foul mood,” Andy said. “He’s not in a happy place. He’s not making his home life that happy because he’s mad, sad, upset. He’s had three or four years now with taking a fight in the night, taking a fight on short notice, being a backup fighter, sitting around waiting for Jon Jones.”
“And then we get a fight, but it’s been fifteen months. So he’s had three minutes fight time in however long it’s been, and he’s just mad that we trained long and hard and lots of cardio to try and do a longer fight because everybody says Tom can’t do that. Well, we’ll show that you can do that.”
Aspinall’s father said the plan was to start slow rather than blitz for the first round finish like in other fights.
“Go out there, take your time,” he said. “Take your time, enjoy it, have a look, see what you think. We know your fitness is absolutely spot on. See how it goes, and he’s mad that he didn’t get to show what we think he can do.”
As for all the questions about Aspinall’s heart, Andy shrugged them off.
“The commentators who commentate, the analysts who do the YouTube channels, they know one fraction of one tiny percentage of Tom Aspinall,” he said. “They think they know him. They don’t. The people who are in the gym every day will know him quite a lot better, and I know him better than anybody.”
“He’s not a giver-upper. That’s not in his nature to give anything up.”
