- Beneil Dariush weighed in on how his fight with Arman Tsarukyan will play out
- The 34-year-old is expecting “Ahalkalakets” to be aggressive
Beneil Dariush thinks he is in for one tough competition as he faces the younger Arman Tsarukyan in a lightweight showdown at UFC Vegas 83.
A difficult situation
Speaking to Michael Bisping in a recent interview, Dariush came clean about his concerns heading into the fight with “Ahalkalakets.” As per Beneil, Tsarukyan already has an advantage simplky because he is younger and eager to prove that he has gone better through his defeats.
“Tsarukyan’s young, he’s hungry and he’s improving all the time. That’s one of the benefits of being young, you can train so much and you’re hungry. It’s a dangerous fight for me because he’s gonna take his losses and he’s gonna improve from those losses and come back and stronger, and one of the best ways to prove that he’s better is beat a guy like me. He lost to Mateusz and I beat Mateusz so if he beats me, he proves himself that he’s grown from his loss. So I think it puts me in a difficult situation because this guy’s really hungry,” Dariush assessed.
Arman will mix and match
When asked how he sees Tsarukyan’s approach coming into the fight, Dariush said that there’s a great chance “Ahalkalakets” will grapple but at the same time, will mix and match until he figures out which one will work to his advantage.
“I think so [he will grapple],” Dariush speculated. “That seems to be his style. I think he’s gonna mix in striking and grappling like he usually does and I think he’ll see which one is favoring him and then he’ll stick to that one. That’s typically how he fights.”
Dariush will be looking to get back to the win column after suffering a devastating first-round TKO loss to Charles Oliveira at UFC 289. On the other hand, Tsarukyan will try and extend his winning streak to three in a row, having beaten Joaquim Silva and Damir Ismagulov.
As it stands, Tsarukyan is No. 6 in the official UFC lightweight rankings and a win over Dariush will surely make him a Top-5 contender and he hopes it could secure him a shot at the title.
Check out Dariush’s full interview below:
