It\u2019s not lost on Tom Nolan what it means to compete in a UFC main event one week after fellow Australian fighter Alexander Volkanovski delivered one of his best career performances.<\/p>\n
This past Saturday at UFC 333, Volkanovski successfully defended his featherweight title with a second-round TKO win over the previously undefeated Movsar Evloev. Now this weekend, Nolan headlines his own card against veteran Renato Moicano at UFC Vegas 123 on Saturday at Meta APEX.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, man I knew he was going to win, but to win like that was very, very impressive against, obviously, an opponent of that level,\u201d Nolan told MMA Fighting. \u201cIt\u2019s insane, to be honest. He doesn\u2019t give away too much. He keeps things close to the chest, so it\u2019s like, it\u2019s hard to know what\u2019s going to happen.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut when he goes out and does that, it\u2019s, honestly, just insane, man. It\u2019s an honor to be the next weekend\u2019s main event after him. It\u2019s pretty cool.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was pretty close to a pick \u2018em once the betting lines closed for the Volkanovski vs. Evloev, but \u201cThe Great\u201d showed he could have been a -3500 favorite with the way he dominated Evloev.<\/p>\n
As Nolan prepares for his first ever UFC headliner, he can\u2019t help but draw energy from Volkanovski\u2019s impressive showing.<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, it\u2019s inspiring,\u201d Nolan said. \u201cIt makes me believe\u2026 like, look at the sport. Ten years ago, we barely had an Aussie in the UFC. Now we\u2019ve got two, back-to-back on a weekend. It\u2019s unheard of, you know? It\u2019s crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nolan, a winner of five straight, had originally accepted to face Moicano at UFC 331 on a week\u2019s notice following the withdrawal of Brian Ortega. Nolan says Moicano\u2019s team requested more time to prepare for the surging 26-year-old, and it has led to their faces being on a poster.<\/p>\n
\u201cBig Train\u201d believes saying yes to Moicano for the September card led to a lot of good fortune.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think a combination of I just moved country, me and my missus, we just packed up, we bought a house back home and we had to get that rented out and get our vehicles over, and get all of our clothes and everything to New Zealand, so I think the timing of it is awesome,\u201d Nolan explained. \u201cIt\u2019s like, I\u2019ve shown that I\u2019m all in on this, and I want to be the best, at least the best version of myself as I can be. And then two months later, I\u2019m rewarded with a main event against a veteran, someone I\u2019ve watched my whole career.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo I\u2019d be silly to not take it and run with it, and not put my best foot forward and, and use this opportunity to show who I am. Because I\u2019m only young. I\u2019ve only been in the UFC for a few years. Everyone knows who he is. He\u2019s been around forever. It\u2019s a great opportunity for me, the timing couldn\u2019t be better.\u201d<\/p>\n
Moicano is coming off of an impressive second-round finish over Chris Duncan in the main event of UFC Vegas 115, snapping Duncan\u2019s four-fight win streak.<\/p>\n
Nolan is well aware of the task at hand against a dangerous veteran like Moicano, and while he believes he\u2019s playing with house money, he is quite confident he has a lot more to gain than lose this Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cPuts me smack bang right in the middle of the top 10, which is a beautiful position for a 26-year-old to be in,\u201d Nolan said. \u201cI think I gain nothing but experience, and it just puts me one step closer to my goal. I\u2019ve got nothing to lose, man.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m coming in here, seriously, to do some damage and to win this fight. And I want to do it in very impressive fashion.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s not lost on Tom Nolan what it means to compete in a UFC main event one week…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":945289,"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-945288","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\/945288","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=945288"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/945288\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/945289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=945288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=945288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=945288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}