The loss of Poirier vs. Duffy as headliner of UFC: Dublin could be Louis Smolka’s gain. The 9-1 flyweight was supposed to have his first main card fight in the UFC against Patrick “Paddy” Holohan, at this Saturday’s Fight Night event in Dublin, Ireland. But after the event’s co-main and main event both got cancelled due to injuries, Smolka now finds himself as one half of the evening’s new main attraction.
“It’s been an emotionally rollercoaster,” Smolka told MMAjunkie. “It’s typical fight week, right? A lot of changes happening, people getting injured, whatever – whatever the case may be I’m just ready to go out there and do my job.”
The 24-year old Smolka entered the UFC with a 6-0 record in January of last year, and has only lost a close split-decision to Chris Cariaso since. Now fighting in the headlining bout of Saturday’s UFC Fight Pass event could mean an unprecedented push in popularity for the up-and-coming Hawaiian, but yet, Smolka is keeping his cool.
“It’s still the same approach, I’m still the same guy and we’re going to do the exact same thing,” he said. “But it is nice to be the main event; it’s pretty cool.”
The original main event between Dustin Poirier and Joseph Duffy got cancelled yesterday, after Duffy suffered a concussion during training and didn’t get permission to fight by the UFC. Poirier was offered Norman Parke as a replacement for Duffy, but refused to take the fight and got scratched off the card completely. The fight is likely to be rescheduled to a later date.