5 great UFC fighters who struggle to finish their opponents

#2. Arnold Allen – UFC featherweight

Despite an unbeaten UFC record, Arnold Allen's lack of finishes have left him under the radar somewhat

When the UFC were looking for a featherweight title challenger to replace the injured Max Holloway in his fight with champion Alexander Volkanovski earlier this month, a number of names were mooted.

Those names included the likes of Giga Chikadze, Calvin Kattar, Yair Rodriguez and Josh Emmett, as well as the man who was eventually awarded the shot, Chan Sung Jung.

Curiously, one name that wasn’t mentioned was Arnold Allen, despite the native of England holding a UFC record of 8-0. Why was this? The only reason that stands out would appear to be Allen’s apparent lack of finishing ability.

‘Almighty’ debuted in the UFC back in 2015 with a submission win over Alan Omer. Since then, he’s picked up just one more finish, a come-from-behind choke win over Mads Burnell in 2018. All of his other six victories have gone the distance.

To be fair to Allen, he’s hardly had the easiest opponents to take out, particularly in recent fights. His last three victories have come over Sodiq Yusuff, Nik Lentz and Gilbert Melendez, who have 88 fights between them and have only been finished on seven occasions.

However, cynics would probably suggest that the reason ‘Almighty’ tends to go the distance in the octagon is the fact that he trains at Canada’s Tri-Star Gym, the same camp that produced Georges St-Pierre.

Either way, if he wants to really push into title contention in 2022, a couple of highlight-reel finishes would do Allen the world of good, especially if he can take out Dan Hooker in his next bout in March.

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#1. Leon Edwards – UFC welterweight

Leon Edwards has not picked up a finish in the octagon since 2018

Usually, any fighter who goes on an extremely lengthy winning streak, particularly in one of the UFC’s most loaded divisions, is rewarded with a title shot without much hassle. However, that hasn’t been the case for welterweight Leon Edwards.

Incredibly, ‘Rocky’ has suffered just one defeat since the start of 2015 and that came at the hands of current welterweight kingpin Kamaru Usman on his way up the ladder. Outside of that, the native of Birmingham, England has defeated a total of 11 foes, including nine in a row – ignoring his nocontest with Belal Muhammad.

However, while it now looks like he’ll be granted his shot at gold this year, it seems highly likely that the reason he’s been overlooked on multiple occasions is his lack of finishes in the octagon.

‘Rocky’ has picked up just two finishes during his current nine-fight win streak, a submission of Albert Tumenov in 2016 and a TKO of Peter Sobotta in 2018 – and even that finish was achieved with just one second remaining in the final round.

It’s hard to deny Edwards has phenomenal skills when it comes to fight time. Not only is he a fantastic striker, but he’s also a highly underrated grappler with a massively improved ground game. If anything, he may well be the toughest test that Usman will face during his title reign.

However, when his rivals, the likes of Jorge Masvidal and Gilbert Burns, are capable of explosive finishes, even if they might not be as skilled as ‘Rocky’, it’s easy to understand why he’s been so overlooked by Dana White and company at times.