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Matt Hughes On Why Rashad Evans Lost To Lyoto Machida: “It Comes Down To Bad Coaching”

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The former UFC welterweight champion Matt Hughes believes that Rashad Evans was poorly coached prior to his UFC 98 loss to Lyoto Machida.  According to Hughes, Evans never used any of his stronger set of skills which involves mostly wrestling and takedowns.  Hughes also believes that not having sparring partners that practice a similar discipline to that of Machida’s is a huge mistake when training for such an advanced MMA fighter.

Snip from Hughes:

“I went back and watched the Rashad fight again, and I think it comes down to bad coaching. In the prefight press conference, I heard Rashad say that he didn’t bring anybody in who would resemble Machida’s style. When I heard that, I knew that there might be some problems. That is probably a big reason why Rashad didn’t do very well in the striking area. I also think Rashad should have been coached on using his wrestling talent. He didn’t shoot one takedown that I can remember and he just made it a sparring match. If I was to coach Rashad against Machida, I would have told him to make it a fight, use his wrestling and groundwork to really dictate the match. Not just go out and spar with him. I think Rashad could have done a lot better in that fight. I’m not saying he should have won, but he’s a lot better than he showed on Saturday.”

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