Cuba’s Yoel Romero Loses Bid For UFC Title

News Americas, LAS VEGAS, Nevada, Mon. Mar. 9, 2020: Cuba’s Yoel Romero is being slammed for a poor performance in his bid for the UFC title at UFC 248 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas Saturday night.

Romero was chosen to face UFC title holder, Israel Adesanya, but critics say it was one of the most boring fights to date in the history of the UFC.

Romero combined for only 88 significant strikes. That total was the least in a UFC middleweight title fight since UFC 112 on April 10, 2010, according to ESPN Stats & Information. The fans booed the result after booing throughout. At one point in the third round, people in the crowd started shining the flashlights on their cellphones.

The judges scored it 48-47, 48-47 and 49-46.

Romero expressed disappointment that he couldn’t give fans an exciting fight and was critical of Adesanya for turning it into “a running match.” He said every time he tried to engage Adesanya in the fight, Adesanya would “disappear.”

“It’s impossible to fight against a ghost,” Romero said through an interpreter at his postfight news conference. “I’m gonna start training for track or cross-country because obviously [Adesanya] is a cross-country and a track star, so I need to catch up to his sport.”

Romero said he wasn’t frustrated about his performance but felt ashamed for the fans.

“I feel that the fight game now is whoever runs the fastest is the winner,” Romero said.

But Adesanya slammed Romero Monday for blowing his title fight opportunity. “I love fighting, this is what I love to do. So after the fight, I was frustrated, I was like, ‘You’re going to act like that?’ Me and him know you can act all you want, you can try to get the crowd on the side all you want bro. Me and him know, me and him know who pushed that fight, me and him know who was scoring in that fight. So I mean, he has to live with this for the rest of his life,” Adesanya said.