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UFC lightweight Brendan ‘Badger’ O’Reilly may have fallen short in his UFC debut but he’s already looking ahead to his next fight.
The Brisbane-based O’Reilly, who was a competitor for Team Australia in The Ultimate Fighter: Nations, faced off against China’s winner of the same show, Lipeng Zhang, in Macau last weekend.
The Aussie showed true grit and determination en route to losing by unanimous decision.
Fresh from the journey home and with a few battle scars to show for it, O’Reilly spoke with me about his UFC debut, his time in The Ultimate Fighter house and his plans for the future.
Jason Tullio: How are you feeling now?
Feeling pretty good. A little sore from some of the bumps and bruises I got from the fight but my spirits are high and I’m staying positive.
Could you give us your thoughts on your last fight?
Obviously I’m disappointed in the result and to be honest I’m disappointed in my performance. I know I could do better but I think a lot of fans were happy with the heart and toughness that I showed. As long as I can work on the holes that I left in that particular fight and work on improving for the next one.
You mention some holes in your game, could you expand on that?
I definitely think my cage wrestling let me down which, in the past, has been a strong point. I didn’t have the opportunity to do enough of that before this fight just because training partners for this camp were in short supply.
That’s something I’ll definitely be working on for the next fight. I think the weight cut probably hurt me a little bit for that one and it was just more of a physical thing that I’ll address for the next one.
Was it a tough weight cut for you?
Yeah, it was. Right near the end of the weight cut it got pretty tough and I think it’s just because physically I hold a fair bit of muscle. That’s just my body type. Some guys cut weight easier than others and I’ve done that cut before but this time it was particularly tough.
I’m a little older, I guess. My body is just really holding on to the muscle mass so something I’m going to look at addressing is whether I’m going to walk around lighter, which is actually pretty tough for me, or maybe move up a division. So we’ll see what happens there.
How was your time in the TUF house?
My time in the TUF house was amazing for me because it was the first and only time so far in my career where I’ve been able to just focus on being a student. I had some world-class coaches there every day pushing me and teaching me new things. I found my rate of improvement was amazing.
It really helped me physically develop as a fighter and also mentally to gain confidence in myself. That sort of thing, a decentralised camp, is what I’m looking to do probably for the next fight where I’m purely a student again and can just focus on being ready.
You run your own gym, do you find that it’s hard to have a decentralised camp in Australia?
It’s definitely hard running the gym and trying to train at the same time. I’ve got some great assistant coaches here, some really good talent. What I’ll be looking to do is have my assistant coaches look after things for a little while so I can go away possibly overseas for a few weeks just to get that focused training before the next fight.
I think it’s really important for me to put in a good performance that I know I can do in the next fight that’s indicative of my skill level and what I can show to the UFC and to the fans.
Did you feel like the different levels of experience between Team Australia and Team Canada was a big factor?
Not necessarily, I don’t think. We do have a tiny disadvantage in the wrestling department just because wrestlers are a commodity that we don’t really have out here in Australia. So, of course that’s going to be a little tougher when we fight. On the flip side, I think our striking here in Australia is definitely world-class.
We’ve got some great Muay Thai fighters here and some boxers so our striking for MMA in Australia is really good. So I think we’ve just got to look at how to implement our style. Instead of trying to out-wrestle guys that are good wrestlers we’ve got to look at nullifying their wrestling and using our strengths. I don’t think there is too much of an experience disadvantage to us Australians.
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