Merab Dvalishvili has the largest combat of his profession when he headlines Noche UFC on the Sphere on September 14th towards bantamweight champ Sean O’Malley.
Dvalishvili continues to be tight together with his longtime staff at Serra-Longo in New York, however since shifting to Las Vegas he’s been coaching out of Syndicate MMA beneath head coach John Wooden. And whereas Wooden is undoubtedly working onerous on Merab’s capacity to hold with a striker of O’Malley’s pedigree, he’s not seeking to re-invent the Georgian into one thing he’s not.
“I all the time, as a coach, have a look at the issues that make Sean Sean and what we have to do to get round it,” Wooden advised Purple Nook MMA. “And I by no means wanna overlook what received Merab to the dance, what introduced Merab into this combat.”
“We’ve to attempt to hold these issues in test, and never lose ourselves,” he continued. ”’Oh, now we have to go be taught conventional boxing. We’ve to do this stuff to compete with O’Malley.’ As a result of that’s how we’re gonna get knocked out.”
So what’s Wooden’s aim when engaged on the evolution of Merab Dvalishvili?
“Merab is a loopy man, we’ve simply began to make him a technical loopy man,” Wooden mentioned. “Sean, there’s all the time holes in all people’s sport. When you’re actually good at this, it opens up this. When you’re actually good at countering that, it opens up this. It’d take us a couple of extra occasions to get the place we have to get, however we’re gonna get there.”
“We’ve by no means seen Sean get pressured sufficient to the place he breaks. However once you begin to stress him, there’s a stage of he does get drained. He does begin to get a bit no matter, however he’s very composed. He’s a world champion for a purpose, so it’s not like you’ll be able to stress Sean and he simply goes to s—. But when Merab can do Merab?”
All Dvalishvili has to do is keep away from getting knocked out like his good friend and coaching accomplice Aljamain Sterling.
“We’ve received a man in right here proper now that’s a world champion striker who’s a sniper identical to O’Malley,” Wooden mentioned. “He’s constructed like him, doing issues like him. There’s a variety of actually good strikers [at Syndicate]. I’m not saying he’s O’Malley, however we’ve received a variety of guys that may emulate that. I don’t suppose anyone on the market can emulate what Merab does, the chaos that he brings.”
“Each combat since he’s been right here on the health club, he’s getting higher,” Wooden assessed. “And he’s studying the way to management and use his weapons correctly. So Sean’s superb. There’s only a few holes. However there’s positively issues we are able to capitalize on that we are going to capitalize on.”