Bantamweight champion Merab Dvalishvili successfully defend his title at UFC 311 in January but was nearly pulled from the fight due to injuries and a staph infection.
“The Machine” defeated Umar Nurmagomedov in Inglewood, Calif., but his coaches had given serious consideration to pulling him from the event. Dvalishvili’s coach, John Wood, revealed the multiple issues his fighter was dealing with heading into the UFC 311 title bout.
“I think that Umar was going to be the toughest fight for Merab at the time,” Wood told MMA Fighting. “I think we’ll end up fighting him again some time and same thing, we beat them. They asked for the fight and [they came out] ‘Oh I’m injured, I’m this, I’m that.’ Well, Merab was half-dead for that fight.
“You don’t understand, he had an open wound, he had a staph infection, he was on all kinds of antibiotics. I personally, if it was up to me honestly, and I haven’t really told anybody, I probably would have pulled him out of the fight. I honestly would have.”
“It was that bad but that dude that could barely walk but then he goes spar 10 rounds and looks phenomenal,” Wood continued. “So I knew he could do it. So I knew that in the room, I was like we’re going to win this fight but in the back of my head, I was like Jesus, he’s so banged up.”
