Khabib Nurmagomedov Almost Got Knocked Out By Dustin Poirier: Crucial Moments From The Fight

Two of the best lightweight in UFC at the moment, Khabib Nurmagomedov and Dustin Poirier were just involved in one of the biggest title defense in UFC lightweight history. Well, the match did live up to the hype for sure. Although Khabib Nurmagomedoz fairly dominated Dustin Poirier until he submitted him, Poirier had some good moments too.

Nurmagomedov and Poirier started the fight with trading strikes for a while before Khabib took Poirier down. Though Poirier scrambled his way up eventually, it almost felt like the fight was over in the first round. On the ground, the lightweight champion went for a rear-naked choke on Dustin Poirier. However, Poirier scrambled to get out of that choke, but in the process, he spent a lot of energy which affected his stand up going forward.
Though Nurmagomedov didn’t get the submission in the first round, he made Poirier realized what it’s like to be held down on the ground by someone who has been grappling his entire life.

Well, the second round begins and as always the fight started on the ground. For some reason, Nurmagomedov decided to trade punches with Poirier who is a far superior boxer. It’s safe to say that, Khabib Nurmagomedov was one big punch away from getting knocked out and losing his lightweight title as well as his undefeated record. Poirier tagged Nurmagomedov with some clean strikes and made Nurmagomedov run around the octagon to save the fight. What Nurmagomedov did well was he rolled with the punches while going backwards until he shook those punches off.

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Fans were on the edge of the seats as Poirier was chasing the champion for a knockout. However, Nurmagomedov recovered and went for a takedown. Now it’s very strange for Poirier to pull up Guillotine every time someone tries to take him down. He did the same against Eddie Alvarez and he did follow the same game plan in Khabib’s fight too which might just cost him the title in the 3rd round.

Though Nurmagomedov dominated for a fair amount of time in the first two rounds, Poirier has made fans believed that Nurmagomedov can be knocked out.

However, Poirier again committed the same mistake of pulling the guillotine, trying to submit Nurmagomedov in the third round which cost him the fight, to be honest. Poirier did not control Nurmagomedov’s legs which allowed the champion to scramble and create enough space to get out of the guillotine. Although the choke was tight, Khabib got out of it eventually and in the whole process of trying to squeeze Khabib’s light out, Poirier was exhausted. After that, it was a downward slide for Poirier. Arguably the best grappler in UFC history took the back of an exhausted Poirier very easily and it was a quick tap from the former interim lightweight champion.

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Even if this was Khabib Nurmagomedov’s toughest fight yet, Nurmagomedov did not even lose a single round on the judges’ scorecards. With this win over Poirier, Khabib Nurmagomedov is likely to defend his title against Tony Ferguson. On the other hand, Poirier will have to climb the mountain again to get the title shot. Nevertheless, Khabib Nurmagomedov vs Dustin Poirier was the toughest fights in both of their careers.