We’re sorry to be the bearers of bad news.
We can pump the brakes on the excitement we all felt when confirmation seemingly arrived that Darren Till’s next fight was the one we all wanted to see.
UFC President Dana White claimed on Tuesday night that a decision had been made to move the card slated for February 24, originally scheduled to take place in Orlando, to England so that Liverpool’s Till could meet Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson.
LA Times reporter Lance Pugmire broke the news that Till, who has been proclaimed ‘The Future’ by White following his victory over Donald Cerrone in Gdansk, had received his wish for the meeting of the two most talented strikers in the UFC’s welterweight division.
Dana White says he’s moving his UFC card from Orlando, moving it to England so popular Darren Till can fight @WonderboyMMA
— Lance Pugmire (@pugboxing) November 8, 2017
Well, it turns out that claim may have been a tad premature because Thompson has not been contacted by anyone in relation to a clash with Till, who hails from Walton.
‘Wonderboy’ is apparently nursing several injuries picked up in his unanimous decision victory over Jorge Masvidal on the main card of UFC 217 last weekend and would not be interested in fighting Till, who is ranked eighth in the UFC’s 170lbs division.
“We’ve talked to no one [about fighting Till],” Thompson’s head coach and father, Ray, told MMA Fighting. “Not sure how this is a ‘done deal.’ As for Till, he needs to fight through the murderer’s row at welterweight like ‘Wonderboy’ did to get to the top.
Remember the name https://t.co/UoG00XGhkP
— FootballJOE (@FootballJOE) October 22, 2017
“We want to fight forward. We’ve been calling out [Robbie] Lawler since before the first Woodley fight and have gotten crickets on it. Why? Why hasn’t anyone talked to us about it? No one from the UFC, no one from Lawler’s camp, no one. ‘Wonderboy’ had one of the most fantastic, exciting fights when he fought [Tyron] Woodley at UFC 205. That fight stole the show.
“The second fight was a snoozefest, mostly because ‘Wonderboy’ chased Woodley around the Octagon for five rounds. We take part of the blame since we didn’t pull the trigger often enough. Since then we feel like we are being moved out of title contention. Not saying that’s the case but it sure looks that way. What happened to the rankings?”
In a matter of hours, we’ve actually managed to lose information about Till’s next outing. We never knew which UK city was going to host the fight on February 24 and now, we don’t know who Till is fighting either.
