{"id":317075,"date":"2025-11-30T20:48:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-30T20:48:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/317075\/"},"modified":"2025-11-30T20:48:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-30T20:48:07","slug":"aspinall-accuses-gane-of-intentional-eye-pokes-cheating-from-the-first-second","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/317075\/","title":{"rendered":"Aspinall accuses Gane of intentional eye pokes: \u2018Cheating from the first second\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s been just over five weeks since Ciryl Gane poked Tom Aspinall in both eyes, ending their UFC 321 title fight in a disappointing \u2018No Contest.\u2019<\/a> Everyone and their mother has an opinion on Aspinall\u2019s decision not to continue, and more than a few people have mocked Tom<\/a> for \u2018quitting.\u2019<\/p>\n

Now the UFC heavyweight champion is speaking in a new video on YouTube, and he\u2019s not happy with how things went down. The British are well known for their sarcastic wit and Tom wasn\u2019t holding back talking about the condition of his eyes.<\/p>\n

\u201cMate, I\u2019ve been having a lovely time just in and out of the hospital, getting all kinds of different tests on my eyes and speaking to specialists, speaking to surgeons, speaking to doctors,\u201d Aspinall said. \u201cOh, it\u2019s been a fantastic time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI actually got eye poked twice in the fight,\u201d he explained. \u201cFirst one wasn\u2019t too bad. He got warned for it. The second one, obviously, Ciryl Gane tried to make my head a bowling ball with the double eye poke, knuckle deep in both. So, yeah, wouldn\u2019t recommend it at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that when it initially happened, I didn\u2019t really think much of it,\u201d Aspinall said. \u201cI thought, \u2018Accidental eye poke, whatever.\u2019 But when I watched the fight back, that\u2019s when I really got the gist of what was going on. The guy was trying to poke my eyes out all the way through that round.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMultiple exchanges, nearly every exchange that I could put him in danger, he had his fingers out pointing towards my eyes \u2026 The guy was cheating from the first second, and the way that he wanted to win that fight was to have me compromised by cheating.\u201d<\/p>\n

The YouYube video included a breakdown of clips from the fight showing Gane throwing his outstretched fingers at Aspinall\u2019s face.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy thoughts on him?\u201d Aspinall concluded. \u201cI think he\u2019s a big cheater.\u201d<\/p>\n

Aspinall also fired back at those who believe he should have kept fighting<\/a> after the foul.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t continue,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ll tell you why I didn\u2019t continue. Because I\u2019m not a dummy. Like, I\u2019m not gonna go out there and fight one of the best strikers in the world if I can\u2019t see. If you get double eye poked in both eyes and you\u2019ve got no vision because of a foul, why should I carry on so some dummy can look and say, \u2018Oh, yeah, Tom just got knocked out.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI ain\u2019t gonna fight if I can\u2019t see anything because of a foul. If it\u2019s a legal move, we have to fight through it. That\u2019s what we do as fighters. But when it\u2019s a foul, why am I gonna put my health at risk when I can\u2019t see at all?\u201d<\/p>\n

Aspinall said he\u2019s still being treated by doctors and eye specialists and has no clear indication of when he might be able to return to training, let alone fight again.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not up to me, it\u2019s up to the doctors,\u201d he said. \u201cAt the minute I\u2019m not allowed to do nothing, so I\u2019m just following advice at the moment. What\u2019s next? What\u2019s next for me right now is this talk of surgery on the eye.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re gonna see how it goes over the next few weeks. Obviously, that\u2019s down to the specialists and stuff, but I\u2019m not in the gym training at the moment. I\u2019m not doing anything MMA-wise at the moment. I\u2019m just following the doctor\u2019s orders right now and, seeing what happens with my health.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the last update days after UFC 321, Aspinall\u2019s father said Tom was not happy<\/a> with how the past couple of years have played out. Tom shared a similar outlook now, a month later.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you were sidelined from doing your job for like fifteen months, not allowed to do anything,\u201d Aspinall said. \u201cYou train your ass off for six months for a fight, then get double eye poked, be left with no vision for nearly six weeks because of an illegal move.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow do you think I feel? Not feeling fantastic, am I?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s been just over five weeks since Ciryl Gane poked Tom Aspinall in both eyes, ending their UFC…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":317076,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,82,702],"class_list":{"0":"post-317075","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-mma","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-ufc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=317075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317075\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/317076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=317075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=317075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=317075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}