Former UFC lightweight champion Charles Oliveira was left frustrated by referee Keith Peterson’s officiating of this past weekend’s co-main event.
Oliveira delivered one of the performances of the night at Saturday’s UFC 309 pay-per-view, where he added a second victory over former three-time Bellator champion Michael Chandler to his record.
First time around, “Do Bronx” was swarmed early and had to mount an incredible comeback to finish “Iron” in round two and have the 155-pound gold wrapped around his waist.
In the rematch three and a half years later at Madison Square Garden, things were simpler for the Brazilian for the most part and it was instead Chandler tasked with coming from behind.
The fifth and final frame saw the American come close to doing so after he rocked Oliveira on the feet and established a dominant position on the ground. The onslaught of strikes that followed, however, caused controversy as they largely appeared to cannon into the back of the eventual victor’s head.
And that was just the latest instance of apparent fouling, with fans highlighting fence grabs during the fight and “Do Bronx” complaining of eye pokes and glove grabbing.
During his post-fight press conference at MSG, Oliveira shed light on the multitude of fouls dealt his way at UFC 309, questioning why referee Peterson didn’t intervene a single time.
“I’m not here to criticize,” Oliveira said. “But I wanna tell you something: there were a lot of blows to the back of the head, a lot of fence grabbing. There was also some eye pokes. And I was telling the ref what was going on, I was calling for his attention and nothing would happen. I hoped that he would intervene, but nothing happened.”
This is far from the first time Chandler has been accused of deliberate fouling. He notably caught the wrath of Dustin Poirier in the aftermath of their fight after appearing to fishhook “The Diamond” during a grappling exchange.
Oliveira thankfully didn’t have to deal with that kind of foul, and he ultimately recovered from some egregious back-of-the-head blows to have his hand raised by way of a convincing unanimous decision.
He’ll now turn his attention to the expected lightweight title clash between champ Islam Makhachev and challenger Arman Tsarukyan next month in Los Angeles, as he gears up to potentially battle the winner later in the year.