5 most explosive moments from UFC Fight Night: Alexander Volkov vs. Tom Aspinall

#4. Paddy Pimblett blows the roof off O2 Arena with his second UFC win

Paddy Pimblett picked up his second octagon win by choking out Kazula Vargas last night.

Last night’s event featured a total of four submission wins. With no disrespect to Tom Aspinall, Paul Craig and Makwan Amirkhani, the most explosive finish came from breakout star Paddy Pimblett. That was largely because he literally blew the roof off the arena with his win.

Faced with the largely unheralded Kazula Vargas, ‘The Baddy’ was heavily favored to win. However, like on his UFC debut against Luigi Vendramini, he didn’t exactly make it easy.

After exchanging blows with the Mexican early on in the fight, Pimblett appeared to be stunned, finding himself in bottom position at one point. However, he didn’t take long to recover, and once he found his rhythm, the fight was largely over.

‘The Baddy’ surprised Vargas with a beautiful hip throw. Once the lightweight hit the deck, he wasted no time in spinning around to take the Mexican’s back. From there, the Liverpool native quickly locked up a rear naked choke, forcing Vargas to tap out moments later, sending the crowd into an absolute frenzy.

If he’s to make it to the top of the promotion, there can be no doubt Pimblett will face tougher opponents. Nevertheless, this was another exciting, explosive performance from him, and it’s difficult not to perceive him as a star at this point.

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#3. Ilia Topuria ends Jai Herbert in brutal fashion

Ilia Topuria crumpled Jai Herbert impressively in the second round of their bout.

After his confrontation with Paddy Pimblett in the week building up to last night’s event, there was more spotlight on lightweight prospect Ilia Topuria than ever before. Thankfully for ‘El Matador’, he delivered the goods in absolutely devastating fashion.

Early on, it didn’t look like things would go well for him. Despite Jai Herbert probably not being as heralded as either Ryan Hall or Youssef Zalal – who had previously fallen to Topuria – he had the Georgian in big trouble early on.

Herbert dropped Topuria in the opening minute with a glancing head kick. He then rocked Topuria badly again later in the stanza, even knocking his mouthpiece out at one point.

It looked like ‘El Matador’ was on his way to losing. However, early in the second round, he turned things on their head. Topuria cracked Herbert with a sickening three-punch combination that knocked him silly, allowing him to walk away rather than follow up once he noticed that his foe was unconscious.

Will the win be enough to net him a meeting with Pimblett in the octagon? Who knows. However, the fact that ‘El Matador’ now finds himself $50K richer thanks to this brutal performance should be enough to make him a very happy man.