Dana White Blames Arnold Allen Corner for Lack of Urgency at UFC on ESPN 44

For all intents and purposes, Arnold
Allen performed well in his first five-round fight.

It just wasn’t well enough to get the win, as the Englishman
dropped a five-round verdict to ex-featherweight champ Max
Holloway in the UFC
on ESPN 44 headliner at the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City,
Missouri on Saturday night. UFC president Dana White came away
impressed with Allen’s performance but would have liked a little
more urgency from “Almighty” down the stretch.

“I thought he looked good,” White said. “He kept the pace, kept the
distance, controlled the tempo of the fight. I thought that Allen
looked incredible. If you think about it, it’s his first big night
ever in a main event, the whole crowd’s against him and he came on
too late.

“If he’d have fought the way [he fought] in the fifth round [from]
the third round on, he would have had a better chance of winning
that fight. I’m not a cornerman or a coach, but I think there
should have been a sense of urgency earlier. But I’m not a
cornerman.”

Knowing he was well behind on the scorecards, Allen did some of his
best work in the fifth round, but it wasn’t enough to produce a
finish. With that, his 10-fight UFC winning streak is a thing of
the past. There is plenty for Allen to build upon, however.

“Young guy, up-and-coming, gets ranked in the Top 5 and he’s the
main event in a place where the entire crowd is cheering against
him,” White said. “It’s a lot of pressure for a guy. I thought he
handled it well. He’s obviously talented enough. He went five
rounds with Max
Holloway, one of the best ever.

“I think he poured it on a little too late but I’m not his
cornerman. I think there were a lot of mistakes made tonight in the
corner,” White continued. “Obviously, he’s got that experience
under his belt now and they’ve got to go back and figure out what
went wrong and what was broken, and fix it and come back. He’s a
talented kid.”