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Taila Santos recently opened up about her five-round war with Valentina Shevchenko at UFC 275. The closely-contested matchup witnessed UFC women’s flyweight champion Shevchenko retain her title via split decision. The MMA community has been divided in its opinion as to who deserved the win on the judges’ scorecards.
Some argue that Taila Santos’ dominant grappling from rounds one to three sealed the fight for her. Others note that Valentina Shevchenko significantly out-struck the challenger throughout the fight, and won both the striking and grappling exchanges in the fourth and fifth rounds.
In a recent edition of The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani, Santos has now asserted that she deserved to get her hand raised. Discussing how confident she was heading into her fight against women’s MMA’s No. 1-ranked pound-for-pound fighter, Valentina Shevchenko, the Brazilian stated:
“Yes, I was very confident. That’s what I worked my entire life towards, and within two big fights in UFC, I was able to get my title shot. And I was able to show the world that she’s human. She’s not a monster. She does have weaknesses that we were able to map out and work on. And that’s the thing.”
Additionally, jibing at ‘Bullet’ for purportedly counting her out leading up to their fight, Santos said:
“She said on the interview that she couldn’t see me beating her in any area, and I was able to show that there a quite a few things that you can do against her that are going to get you to success.”
Check out Santos’ takeaways from her fight against Shevchenko in the video below:
Aljamain Sterling explains why Valentina Shevchenko deserved the win over Taila Santos at UFC 275
Reigning UFC women’s flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko has suggested that she could face Miesha Tate next, provided Tate wins her upcoming fight against Lauren Murphy at UFC 276 on July 2nd.
Meanwhile, Santos is working on recovering from an orbital bone fracture she suffered at UFC 275.
Intriguingly, UFC men’s bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling subsequently addressed the Shevchenko-Santos matchup and explained why ‘Bullet’ deserved to get her hand raised at UFC 275.
'Funk Master' highlighted that while Santos out-grappled Shevchenko, it was 'Bullet' who out-struck her opponent on the mat. On his podcast, The Weekly Scraps, Sterling said:
"I think the story of this fight was the takedowns didn't score heavily in the judges' eyes. I'm the first to say it, if I take you down and I do absolutely nothing and you are punching me in the face the entire time, I think the score should go towards the person doing the damage because it's a fist fight."
Watch the full video below:
