Holly Holm came agonizingly close to making a successful first defence of the UFC woman’s bantamweight title against Miesha Tate at UFC 196 on Saturday night as she was ahead on the scorecards heading into the final round before being choked unconscious.
It’s a tough loss to take for the 34 year-old who gained worldwide attention just a few months ago when she became the first woman to defeat Ronda Rousey, and she’s eager to make amends as soon as possible.
“I’ll be training right away and I’ll take the fight as soon as they’ll give anything to me,” Holm stated at the post-fight press conference in Las Vegas. “It’s whatever opportunity they’ll give me right now. We’ll see where they want to go with this.”
That being said, what Holm wants most of all right now is to get an immediate rematch with Tate.
“I do want a rematch. Who doesn’t? If you’re at this point in your career, making this your career, it’s because you have passion for it. It’s because you have pride. It’s because you have that want for victory and that is what I want. The biggest thing that hurts right now is my heart. I just gotta get back in and work hard. I do want the rematch, but who’s to say they’ll give it to me right away? If I have to fight somebody else to get there, if I have to fight my way back, that’s OK, too, because I’m OK and I can put in the hard work to do that. I’m willing to do that.
“I’m ready to go as soon as they’re ready to give me a fight.”
It remains to be seen what will come next for Holm, though in the immediate aftermath of the event, UFC president Dana White suggested that Tate is now likely to have a trilogy fight with Ronda Rousey instead, so ‘The Preacher’s Daughter’ may indeed have to fight someone else in the mean time.
Regardless of who she does eventually get matched up with, Holm has made it clear that she intends to come back better than ever.
“Tonight I made some mistakes and that’s all it comes down to. I need to fix those mistakes and I’m going to come back stronger.”
