"You might as well cheat" - Aljamain Sterling raises alarm in wake of referee Keith Peterson allowing Michael Chandler to land multiple illegal blows

MMA referee Keith Peterson has been facing a lot of backlash for his work in the Chrales Oliveira vs. Michael Chandler fight at UFC 309. During the clash, Chandler committed several offences, including grabbing the fence on multiple occasions and landing illegal strikes to the back of Oliveira's head.

All of those incidents when unnoticed by Peterson, who never stepped in to take action against 'Iron'.

Former UFC bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling recently weighed in on the situation on his The Weekly Scraps podcast. Sterling shared that if there are more such incidents in the future, fighters might get encouraged to cheat:

"Keith Peterson is my guy. But I don't even know what was going on in that fight. Keith, I love you, but that was crazy. I know even if you watch it, you're gonna be like, 'Yeah, I f**ked up.'... You might as well just cheat, bro, 'cause if the refs aren't gonna call it then who gives a s**t."

Check out Aljamain Sterling's comments on Charles Oliveira vs. Michael Chandler below:

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Charles Oliveira comments on Keith Peterson not reacting to Michael Chandler's fouls

The fight between Charles Oliveira and Michael Chandler was a five-round co-main event at UFC 309, which ended with a unanimous decision victory for the Brazilian.

Oliveira then made an appearance at the post-fight press conference, where he addressed the issue of Keith Peterson not taking action against any of Chandler's fouls in the fight:

"I'm not here to criticize but I'm going to 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 referee] what was going on. I kept calling for his attention and nothing would happen. I would hope that he would intevene. but nothing happened."

Check out Charles Oliveira's comments below (2:08):