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Dustin Poirier’s (30-8) longtime coach, Mike Brown, claims “The Diamond” has made necessary adjustments to his game after his loss against Khabib Nurmagomedov.
Poirier suffered a third-round submission loss against “The Eagle” in his first undisputed title shot at UFC 242 in 2019. Poirier is now scheduled to fight Nurmagomedov’s protégé Islam Makhachev (25-1) in the UFC 302 headliner on June 1 at Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey. With both Nurmagomedov and Makhachev sporting very similar wrestling-heavy styles, Poirier believes he has a fair understanding of what’s coming his way.
“Islam and Khabib have similar styles,” Poirier said. “I got to have a bit of understanding of the pressure, the strength and the style of wrestling that those guys have. It’s kind of a little bit of serendipity here cause now I’m fighting his protégé. Once again for the world title.”
Brown, Poirier’s longtime coach at American Top Team, claims his pupil has fixed the holes that were exposed in the fight against Nurmagomedov. They have been focusing on wrestling, which he believes will hold its own against Makhachev.
“Khabib showed us where we had some holes,” Brown said. “We’ve worked on it and those holes are patched. We’re working on anti-wrestling and getting back to our feet, that’s no secret. Dustin will put him away. This will just be the cherry on top of an unbelievable career, one of the best careers I think the sport has seen. Nobody’s more deserving, nobody’s paid the dues more than Dustin Poirier. It’s his time.”
Meanwhile, Nurmagomedov doesn’t believe Poirier has made any significant development since losing to him and expects Makhachev to outclass the Louisianan in all aspects.
This article first appeared at Recent News on Sherdog.com
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