Dubai: It was a big night for Morocco’s Youssef Zalal and Afghanistan’s Nasrat Haqparast, who scored impressive wins on a UFC Fight Night card where heavyweight Derrick Lewis recorded the 24th win of his career in the main event against Aleksei Oleinik.
Zalal enjoyed every minute of his three-rounder with England’s Peter Barrett, a Contender Series champion, throwing punches at will and scoring a series of takedowns to leave the judges with no doubt about his superiority. The judges scored the fight 30-26, 30-26, 30-27.
“I feel good. I’m young, I just learn every day and every fight, so I did a lot better than the last fight, I’m happy with that,” said 23-year-old Zalal.
“This is my second fight in six weeks. It just shows the hard work that we did for the past … I don’t know how many years. I got an amazing team, amazing people around me,
“I’m blessed and grateful for the opportunities. These opportunities don’t come around that often, so when you have the chance, you take them.”
However, it was a hard-luck story for Jordan’s Ali Alqaisi who gave his all on his Octagon debut but did not do enough to convince the judges who awarded the fight to Mexico’s Irwin Rivera.
Alqaisi was making history as the first Jordanian to fight in the UFC.
Results
Derrick Lewis defeated Aleksei Oleinik via TKO at 0:21 of round 2
Chris Weidman defeated Omari Akhmedov via unanimous decision
Darren Stewart defeated Maki Pitolo via submission at 3:41 of round 1
Yana Kunitskaya defeated Julija Stoliarenko via unanimous decision
Beneil Dariush defeated Scott Holtzman via TKO at 4:38 of round 1
Tim Means defeated Laureano Staropoli via unanimous decision
Kevin Holland defeated Joaquin Buckley via TKO at 0:32 of round 3
Nasrat Haqparast defeated Alexander Munoz via unanimous decision
Andrew Sanchez defeated Wellington Turman via KO at 4:14 of round 1
Gavin Tucker defeated Justin Jaynes via submission at 1:43 of round
Youssef Zalal defeated Peter Barrett via unanimous decision
Irwin Rivera defeated Ali Alqaisi via split decision
