Alex Pereira coaches disagree with UFC 313 decision, promise ‘Poatan 2.0’ in Magomed Ankalaev rematch

Alex Pereira lost his UFC light heavyweight title this past Saturday in Las Vegas, with Magomed Ankalaev narrowly winning a close five-round decision to claim the 205-pound gold in the main event of UFC 313.

Unsurprisingly, Pereira’s coaches disagree with the scorecards.

Plinio Cruz and Glover Teixeira discussed the result on a video posted Wednesday on Pereira’s YouTube page, saying they saw their fighter being superior in rounds one, three and five. All three judges were unanimous in giving “Poatan” the edge in the first, with only one judge scoring the fifth in his favor. Ankalaev won the third round with a 10-9 score in every official scorecard.

“We had this defeat, but in my opinion he won,” Teixeira said. “He lost on points, so now we go back to the drawing board and adjust a few things, train hard and go back and get this rematch and make history. Poatan has made history before, and he will make history again. He’s a great warrior and I’m very proud of him.”

Cruz echoed Teixeira and vowed to help Pereira get back on track and reclaim the belt if given a rematch. On top of that, Cruz saw UFC 313 as a learning experience not only for the fighter, but the entire team.

“Life is made of ups and downs, and those ups and downs are what make us who we are on this journey to our goal,” Cruz said. “We’ll come back stronger, regroup as a team. The vibe was great this week, we have no excuses. Poatan was fine, and I think he won the fight. This is a stumble, not a fall, and it will only make him stronger, our team stronger. Humans evolve more in times of adversity.

“Rivalries make us grow. It went his way this time, so we’ll train more, study more, get better, to deliver you a better version of Poatan. More mean. What this guy’s done was make it worse for him because now he’ll fight ‘Poatan 2.0.’ It’s happened to Poatan before, it’s not the first time, and a true champion is the one that stumbles but continues moving forward and reconquers it. Poatan will reconquer the belt in the rematch. A more mean version. And our team will be on a level that is higher than it already is.”

Pereira complained about Ankalaev’s strategy immediately after the bout, saying judges shouldn’t reward a fighter that holds onto his opponents for most of a round, but has yet to watch the fight to give his own thoughts on the decision.

“Of course it’s not the result I wanted,” Pereira said. “We were confident for this fight, I was well. I trained hard. Some things happen, of course, but I don’t want to give excuses. I know we’ll have the rematch, we’re already in talks — for everything I’ve done and the way the fight went. Many people contested [the decision] and were in doubt. I haven’t watched the fight yet, I’ll watch to have my opinion, [because] it’s hard to have an idea when you’re in there.”