Outside Source
On Saturday night, Darren Till looked like “The Gorilla” the MMA world knew a year ago, as he nabbed his first victory in 18 months, a hard-fought split decision win over Kelvin Gastelum.
Till (18-2-1) was taken down multiple times in the fight, which was the co-main event of UFC 244 at Madison Square Garden. However, the Englishman’s crisp striking battered Gastelum on several occasions, attacks that offset the American’s takedowns. It was a close fight that could have realistically gone either way, but two of the three cageside officials favored Till and he finally got back on track after losing two straight bouts.
Earlier in his career, Till was on a hot streak, steamrolling everybody in his path in the welterweight division. After disposing of every contender put in front of him, Till landed a shot at then-champ Tyron Woodley, but he was choked out in the second round at UFC 228. After that, Jorge Masvidal knocked him senseless at UFC London this past March and just like that, Till was an afterthought.
“I think I just had some demons I had to deal with after those losses,” he said after his victory. “We fighters don’t talk about it, but I was just talking from my heart. Before I fought Woodley, I hadn’t been beat in my life in anything. I felt like a superhuman and then I got beat twice, and nowadays with the media, you get slammed even more, so inside I was fighting a lot.”
Till said those demons continued to affect him from the walk to the Octagon until the matchup with Gastelum began.
“To be totally honestly, tonight I was terrified to get in there, just to do the three rounds,” he admitted. “After the first round, I was just like, ‘What’s wrong with you, Darren?’ I knew I was one of the best.”
Till eventually got those thoughts out of his head and secured the win. Till stepped up to fight Gastelum at middleweight, and he said he felt terrific in doing so after spending so much time at 170 pounds. With the demons exorcised now, Till is ready to move forward with his fighting career, and says he’ll literally take on anybody, regardless of how massive or powerful the opponent could be.
“There’s all this BMF talk going on and I just stepped up in weight and fought Kelvin Gastelum, the bulldozer of the middleweight division,” he said. “So I’m just taking this a step at a time and I’m just happy to even be here. Any man over 70 kilos, I should be able to beat them. Weight class doesn’t matter to me. You could come to me tomorrow and tell me I’m fighting the heavyweight champ and I’ll do it. I know I’ll go in there and probably get put in a coma, but I’ll fight him, because I’m a man and a true fighter. I am a BMF.”
This article first appeared at Recent News on Sherdog.com
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