Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza was on a run of four straight first round finishes when he stepped into the Octagon to face Francis Carmont on Saturday night. After 15 minutes of fighting that streak came to an end, but Souza’s winning streak did not as he earned his sixth straight win.
Following the unanimous decision win (29-28, 29-28, 30-27), Souza (20-3-0-1) told the crowd inside the Arena Jaragua that he had fought Carmont with “a lot of fragments in his arm.” After the fight, speaking at the post-fight press conference, Souza went into more detail about the injury he suffered during training camp, (via MMAFighting.com) “I have bone fragments in my left arm and I almost pulled out of the fight, but I asked the UFC to continue. I asked my doctors if I could fight and they said there was a high possibility that I could fight.”
Souza added that the injury left him unable to train anything but legs for the last six weeks of his camp. Souza expects to undergo arthroscopic surgery to clear up the bone fragments. Souza, currently ranked No. 3 in the middleweight division said that he expects to be back training in six weeks.
In his post-fight in cage interview Souza said that when he does get back to training, “I want the champ, I want whoever has the belt, and if the UFC doesn’t think I’m ready for that put anyone ahead of me, and I’ll get over them.”
One of the possible fights that was mentioned was a rematch with the last man to defeat him, No. 6 ranked Luke Rockhold. Souza, seemed less than enthused about the prospect of facing the 11-2 Rockhold who earned a 2011 unanimous decision over Souza, taking the Strikeforce middleweight title in the process. Of that rematch, Souza said, “I want to fight someone who is coming off a win.”
When reminded that Rockhold had knockout out Costa Philippou in mid-January, taking home Knockout of the Night honors, Souza remarked, “Oh… That kick he took from Vitor (Belfort) can’t get out of my head. He’s not well ranked, but if that’s what the UFC wants I would accept to prove I’m better than him.”
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