Paddy Pimblett can put himself directly back in title contention with a win over Benoit Saint Denis at UFC 329, especially after engaging in a five-round war with future lightweight champion Justin Gaethje back in January.<\/p>\n
Despite the loss, Pimblett proved he could hang with the best of the best at 155 pounds and considering he survived 25 minutes with Gaethje while Ilia Topuria couldn\u2019t make it past the fourth round just adds another checkmark in his column. That said, Pimblett has openly stated that he knows it\u2019s probably going to take a win on Saturday and at least one more before the UFC would put him back in there against Gaethje again.<\/p>\n
As far as other viable contenders for the belt, Pimblett scoffed at the suggestion that Arman Tsarukyan should be considered for that title shot after he\u2019s been out of action since October 2025 with no end in sight to his lengthy layoff.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe needs to fight,\u201d Pimblett said during UFC 329 media day on Wednesday. \u201cHe\u2019s had like one fight in three years and he beat an absolute bum. He needs to actually fight. Not go around in a singlet tickling people.\u201d<\/p>\n
Of course, Pimblett referenced Tsarukyan\u2019s most recent win, which came against Dan Hooker in a lopsided performance for his fifth victory in a row overall. He also took aim at Tsarukyan\u2019s biggest activity happening in RAF rather than the UFC where he\u2019s become a mainstay in the freestyle wrestling promotion.<\/p>\n
In fact, Tsarukyan is set to compete on Saturday at an RAF event in Georgia before returning to the United States for a showdown against Colby Covington one week later in Milwaukee. But none of those matches are happening in the UFC, which is Pimblett\u2019s biggest frustration with Tsarukyan whenever he\u2019s mentioned as a top contender at lightweight.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Fight] anyone. Just fight someone,\u201d Pimblett said to Tsarukyan. \u201cGet in the octagon and actually fight. Stop going around on your private jet eating food.\u201d<\/p>\n
When it comes to his own fight, Pimblett is confident he\u2019ll dispatch Saint Denis on Saturday and take the necessary step forward to eventually clash with Gaethje again in the future.<\/p>\n
Pimblett said he learned a valuable lesson from that first fight \u2014 \u2018don\u2019t go to war with Justin Gaethje\u2019 \u2014 but he also knows there were mitigating factors that were working against him that night.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not going to use it as an excuse but the eye poke did change the fight in a big way,\u201d Pimblett said. \u201cThe damage on my face was from an eye poke right hand.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt wasn\u2019t just an eye poke. I felt his thumb touch my brain. So it was a bit heavy. I couldn\u2019t see for about two rounds after it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, Pimblett praised Gaethje for the win as well as going out there and beating Topuria to claim the undisputed title. Now he\u2019s just hoping he\u2019ll get a second crack at Gaethje in the near future.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously with him winning and becoming undisputed champion, it looks good for me,\u201d Pimblett said. \u201cI said after he beat me, I said he was going to beat Ilia Topuria. I said it was fate that he beat me. It was his destiny to win the title at the White House. I was just in the way.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Paddy Pimblett can put himself directly back in title contention with a win over Benoit Saint Denis at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":788015,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,1347,785,85,787,1396,14855],"class_list":["post-788014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-latest-news","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc","tag-ufc-news","tag-videos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=788014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/788015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=788014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=788014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=788014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}