Tom Aspinall is on the comeback trail.
As one of the Heavyweight division’s best rising stars, if not the best, Aspinall suffered an unfortunate 15-second loss in his last fight with Curtis Blaydes in July 2022, tearing his anterior cruciate ligament (ACL). Surgically repaired and ready to return, Aspinall, 30, will headline UFC London on July 22, 2023, against Marcin Tybura.
The pairing came as somewhat of a surprise for many because of Aspinall’s lengthy eight-fight unbeaten streak (five in UFC, all by finish) before his injury against Blaydes. Aspinall is No. 5 in UFC’s Heavyweight rankings, contrasting Tybura’s No. 10 spot. Ultimately, the Brit wants to highlight that the final match up isn’t always the first.
“I wasn’t left with much choice, to be honest,” Aspinall told The Mac Life. “A lot of people keep asking, ‘Why you fighting him?’ I’m like, well, first of all, people are acting like I’m a lot better than him. The guy is literally Top 10 hardest people in the world. The guy is in the Top 10 in the world, that’s good, that’s really good. Also, he’s had about three times more UFC fights than me so let’s not act like he’s some bum because he’s not.
“The reason I’m fighting him is because — there’s a lot of people in the UFC who like to do interviews and say, ‘I’ll fight anybody, I’m a savage, I’m a gangster, and all this,’” he continued. “But when it actually comes to accepting fights, they don’t actually accept the fight. There’s a lot of that that goes on. Not just in my division, across multiple weight divisions. That’s happened, and also, a lot of the Top 10 were already booked so I had to fight down in the rankings a little bit, which I’m fine with.”
Aspinall feels reinvigorated after the time off, which helped him further understand how deeply he loves mixed martial arts (MMA). A win over Tybura might not be enough to get him a title shot, but Aspinall is just looking forward to getting his feet wet again and reminding everyone what he’s capable of.
“I feel like I’ve got a chip on my shoulder,” Aspinall said. “I just want to prove to everyone and also myself that I’m f—king better than Peter Griffin holding his knee (laughs).”
This story originally appeared on MMA Mania
