The UFC 321 main event didn’t make it out of the opening round as many predicted; however, the circumstances around the first-round stoppage weren’t what anyone had in mind.
Tom Apsinall had been counting down the days until he could step back into the Octagon after an extended 456-day layoff. However, his heavyweight title defence against Ciryl Gane ended in an unfortunate and unceremonious manner.
A reckless, albeit seemingly unintentional, double eye poke from Gane resulted in Aspinall being unable to see out of his right eye and the fight was stopped. It was deemed a no-contest and Aspinall retained his title, yet the result left a foul (pun intended) taste in the champion’s mouth.
The 32-year-old star from England is known as one of the true gentlemen in all of combat sports, yet his frustration understandably boiled over after the anticlimactic conclusion to the fight.
The fans in Abu Dhabi were heard booing from the moment the referee made the decision to stop the fight after consulting with Aspinall and the cageside physicians, and the crowd didn’t let up as the fighters were being interviewed.
“Guys, I just got poked knuckle deep in the eyeball. What the (expletive)? Why are you booing?” a frustrated Aspinall said during his post-fight interview with Daniel Cormier. “What am I supposed to do about it? I didn’t do the (expletive) poke? I can’t see. This is (expletive). The fight was just getting going. Complete (expletive). I’m pissed off.”
Cormier, a former UFC heavyweight champ, knows as well as anyone what it’s like to have his vision impaired due to an eye poke in a championship setting. Cormier suffered a left eye injury in his UFC 252 trilogy bout with Stipe Miocic in 2020. Cormier was able to see enough to continue fighting but it was a turning point in that match, and it ended up being the final fight of Cormier’s career.
Aspinall was transported to a nearby hospital following the event, and it’s unclear the extent of the damage.
“I can hardly open my eye,” Aspinall added as a replay of Gane’s fingers going into Aspinall’s eyes was shown on the screens at Etihad Arena. “He was…look, look (expletive) double poke. Both eyeballs.”
UFC president Dana White told reporters afterwards that they plan on rebooking Aspinall vs. Gane at a future date.
“I feel the way everybody feels. Great showing, (expletive) ending,” White said.
Aspinall and Gane were exchanging strikes for more than four minutes before the fight-ending foul. Gane, who insisted he didn’t do it on purpose, landed 30 significant strikes to Aspinall’s 27, though Aspinall was ahead 14-8 on significant head strikes.
Volkov must also be frustrated with Gane: Alexander Volkov did enough to win his fight against Jailton Almeida, and had the main event ended differently, it should’ve been enough to earn the six-foot-seven Russian a title shot since the matchup was dubbed a heavyweight title eliminator ahead of time.
Volkov, who celebrated his 37th birthday on Friday, has already been in the cage with Aspinall and Gane and was eyeing a rematch regardless of who emerged as heavyweight champ. Ironically, the reason Gane was named Aspinall’s opponent instead of perhaps Volkov was because Gane was coming off a controversial win over Volkov late last year. Volkov had an impressive win streak snapped by Gane 10 months ago via split decision that most consider a robbery. Even White told Volkov, “You got (expletive),” following the controversial UFC 310 outcome.
“It’s horrible,” White told Volkov at the time. “I don’t know what we’ll do but we’ll try to make it right by you. The whole (expletive) arena thought you won the fight. They (expletive) that one up bad. I’ll talk to you in a little while. I apologize.”
The way the UFC tried to “make it right” was by having Volkov compete in a title eliminator while Gane was awarded the fourth title fight of his UFC tenure. Volkov’s win over Almeida wasn’t emphatic, so who really knows if the UFC will honour the title eliminator win or if they’ll insist Volkov pick up another win before being given a title shot of his own.
With Aspinall vs. Gane looking like the direction the UFC will go, that’s now two consecutive fights Gane has prevented Volkov from earning a title shot due to controversy.
Takedown attempts galore on main card: The UFC 321 main card started off with a big first-round technical knockout (more on that below), but the three subsequent matchups before the main event were grappling-heavy contests. Almeida attempted nine takedowns on Volkov and couldn’t do much of anything with the seven he landed. Umar Nurmagomedov secured 11 of his 14 takedown attempts and amassed nearly 11 minutes of control time in his decision win over fellow bantamweight Mario Bautista. Then, in the co-main event, Virna Jandiroba shot 17 takedowns on Mackenzie Dern in their 25-minute vacant strawweight title fight.
Dern shot eight of her own and Bautista attempted a single takedown, so that makes 49 total takedown attempts in a stretch of 55 minutes of fight time. Suffice it to say, between how the main event ended and the style of the three fights that preceded it, UFC 321 certainly won’t be a nominee for best main card of the year.
Proper point deductions on prelims: After the recent UFC Fight Night card in Vancouver saw a handful of referee gaffes and fouls that didn’t result in point deductions, UFC 321 was a nice change of pace. During a preliminary card matchup between Azat Maksum and Mitch Raposo, Maksum was deducted a point for an egregious fence grab that resulted in a change of position. Referee Rich Mitchell immediately paused the action, and instead of merely issuing a warning, he took a point from Maksum, which was the correct call.
In the very next fight, heavyweight Hamdy Abdelwahab was deducted a point for a blatant illegal strike against Chris Barnett. Abdelwahab was in a dominant ground position landing strikes, and was warned by referee Marc Goddard to be mindful of where he was placing his shots just seconds before Abdelwahab landed an elbow directly to the back of Barnett’s head. As soon as Abdelwahab landed the illegal elbow, the referee paused the action and deducted a point. Again, no warning, straight to the point deduction, which should be the norm.
Hopefully, that starts to set a precedent because inconsistent officiating and implementation of the rulebook have been some of the unfortunate themes in the sport in 2025.
Salkilld makes statement with highlight KO: The lightweight division consistently produces quality talents, and Quillan Salkilld is at or close to the top of the list of intriguing 155-pound prospects. Simply put, his head kick knockout of Nasrat Haqparast was scary. Salkilld accepted the fight against a much more experienced fighter on less than two weeks’ notice and picked up a KO of the year candidate in half a round. Here’s hoping Haqparast makes a full recovery because he was completely unconscious for several minutes.
Murzakanov can’t be overlooked: The top contenders in the 205-pound division, like Carlos Ulberg, Jiri Prochazka and Magomed Ankalaev, maybe should be a little worried about what Azamat Murzakanov is doing. The only undefeated fighter at UFC 321 kept his unblemished record intact thanks to a first-round TKO of Aleksandar Rakic, who has pushed former champions to the brink on multiple occasions in the past. Murzakanov was at an age, height and reach disadvantage, yet he stopped Rakic with a perfectly timed step-in jab from his southpaw stance.
The 36-year-old Russian is 16-0 as a pro and has won all six of his UFC appearances since debuting in the organization in 2022. On paper, this was Murzakanov’s toughest test so far at the UFC level and he made it look easy.
Although he stands at just five-foot-11, much smaller than all the top light-heavyweight contenders, there’s no denying he’s a dark horse within the division and could be just one more win away from getting a shot at UFC gold.
Strawweight division wide open…for the time being: There’s a new champion at 115 pounds with Mackenzie Dern the newest UFC titleholder, marking a new era in the strawweight division.
The only reason a vacant belt was on the line, however, is because the longtime reigning champion Zhang Weili relinquished her title so she can move up a division to challenge women’s flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko next month at UFC 322.
While it is entirely possible Zhang ends up returning to strawweight, depending on how her fight with Shevchenko goes, her usual weight class is in good hands with Dern, who’s a popular and marketable star.
Dern has an aggressive fighting style, is a former Brazilian jiu-jitsu world champion, and a fan favourite within the women’s divisions. A hypothetical Dern vs. Zhang matchup could be a big fight in the future, but there is also Tatiana Suarez, who got back in the win column in September after falling short in her UFC 312 title bout with Zhang in February. Possible Dern rematches with Amanda Lemos or Loopy Godinez could be within the realm of possibility as well. Canadian-born Gillian Robertson is also on a serious hot streak and would make for a terrific style matchup with Dern.
Not to mention, there are always fighters who quickly rise up the rankings. The 115-pound division also opened the prelims at UFC 321 with Mizuki Inoue making a triumphant return to competition against Jaqueline Amorim. Despite being a significant betting underdog, Mizuki looked sharp against Amorim. The 31-year-old from Japan hadn’t fought since a decision win over Hannah Goldy more than two years ago and had only fought once in the past five years overall, but there was no cage rust to be seen. Mizuki previously lost a five-round split decision to Jandiroba in their pre-UFC days when they fought for the Invicta FC title and has gone the distance with former women’s flyweight champion Alexa Grasso in a Fight of the Night, also in the Invicta organization.
