Tim Means will be facing Alex Oliveira in a rematch this Saturday Night at UFC Fight Night 106.
Their first encounter at UFC 207 ended with a no contest after Means caught Oliveira with an illegal knee strike to the head. Means is now saying with an intentional knee strike to Oliveira’s head.
“I don’t know how they called it accidental,” Means said at the UFC Fight Night 106 media day. “I misconstrued the rules when we were breaking them down in the back (before our first fight), and we have to have this three points of contact, hand down and all that. … I saw his hands up, I saw him trying to defend my knee, and he thought a knee was coming, as well. When I got in the back, there were fighters who also were confused on it. There was a big gray area. I’d take more responsibility on myself and call myself a dumbass if it was only me who thought that the knee was legal. But there was a whole bunch of confusion behind it. … I didn’t try to hurt him or cheat him in any way, but I did try to take him out.”
The fight between Means and Oliveira will be kicking off the main card of the event. Even though their first fight was cut short, the two will just continue from where they left off in Means opinion.
“We’re going to start off where we left off,” Means said. “It was a fight he was losing. He was supposed to outwrestle me and outgrapple me, and it wasn’t working for him. We grabbed ahold of each other, and I was the stronger fighter. I don’t know how he expects to win in front of his friends and family … I expect to put him down in front of his friends and family. There was more in our three-minute fight than in the five-round championship fight (between Tyron Woodley and Stephen Thompson at UFC 209) the other night. I thought a lot went down. I was winning the wrestling and the grappling exchanges, and I’m going to do just that again.”
UFC Fight Night 106 takes place on Saturday, March 11 from the Centro de Formacao Olimpica do Nordeste in Fortaleza, Brazil with Kelvin Gastelum and Vitor Belfort headlining, the main card airs live on Fox Sports 1. Fightful will be providing live coverage of the event, with a post-show podcast to follow.
