Ross Pearson targets a February return to the octagon after undergoing surgery next Thursday
“Ultimate Fighter” season nine winner, Ross Pearson has revealed that he’s targeting a February return to the octagon after undergoing surgery next Thursday to repair a torn knee cartilage and a chipped bone picked up during his UFC Fight Night 22 defeat to Cole Miller.
Speaking via ESPN.co.uk, Pearson said:
“I’m waiting to have an operation next week on my knee. I tore my knee cartilage in the last fight, in the first round, and I’m booked in for next Thursday. I didn’t instantly tell the UFC because I didn’t want to look like I was using it as an excuse. But the scan and news of the operation was going to come out anyway.”
“The surgeons are hoping it’s going to be a straight-forward cleaning out of the cartilage, and hopefully that’s all it will be. But I’ve also chipped a bone in my knee, so he’s going to have to have a look at that and see how serious it is. I think I did that off one of my leg kicks, that’s the only way I can assume I did it.”
“Hopefully I’ll be back soon. I’m still doing upper body workouts, and I’m in the gym doing rolling and things that don’t damage the knee. Ideally I hope to be back before March or April; I’d love to be back in January or February. But that’s totally up to the UFC.”
The Brit revealed that he knee he was in big trouble the moment the injury occurred, throwing his game plan out the window mid fight while squaring off with a very dangerous opponent.
“I can’t pinpoint the exact time that the injury happened, but I think I did it when Cole pulled guard on me, and I kind of twisted at an awkward angle. Pretty much after that I had no movement, and I was just a sitting duck really. I’m not making any excuses or in any way attempting to take the win away from Cole, but I know for a fact I couldn’t move in and out after I tore the cartilage.”
“I think it happened around the two-minute mark, that’s when I remember thinking ’s***’. If you watch the fight, I begin up on my toes and I’m moving alright, but then Cole pulls guard and after that I’m flat-footed, square, and putting all my weight on my left leg – meaning I was walking onto his right hand.”
“It didn’t affect me in thinking ‘oh man I can’t fight on anymore’; the only thing it affected was the gameplan. I just couldn’t do it. The gameplan was to step in and out of range, use my angles, and use my right leg kick to take away his lead leg before finishing it with my right hand. But I couldn’t push off my leg to land anything.”
Pearson made a solid start to his career inside the octagon, impressing against both Aaron Riley and Dennis SIver inside the octagon. Many even started to mention him in the same breath as some of the top contenders in the division, something he’ll have to work hard to recover once he returns early next year.
By Michael Pepper. (Follow me on Twitter)
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