“The fight can get boring and come to a decision.” Pavlovich and Volkov’s sparring partner ends their fight

Just yesterday, Alexander Volkov was considered an opponent for Jailton Almeida at UFC 302 in Chicago on June 1st. But on the night of March 27-28, Dana White announced that Volkov’s next opponent would be Russian Sergei Pavlovich at a tournament in Saudi Arabia. The news came as a surprise to both fighters. Volkov read it in the evening, Las Vegas time, Pavlovich’s team – in the morning, Moscow time. Just know it when you say that in the UFC everything is organized on a fundamentally different level.

At the same time, none of the fighters categorically refused. Largely because the winner of the fight has a real chance to fight for the title, and now Volkov and Pavlovich, after four years of joint fighting in Moscow, can become rivals on June 22.

It is important to clarify that they have never been close friends, that they have not crossed paths in training since the fall of 2022, but that they have always spoken well. Along with Volkov and Pavlovich, ACA Grand Prix finalist Adam Bogatyrev held a sufficient number of training sessions and we asked him to imagine what this fight could be like. Terms:

— If I understand correctly, you fought with each of them relatively recently and hard enough to talk about this fight?

— For some reason, I think this fight won’t happen. I don’t know why, but I have this feeling. I hope it will be like that. Let’s see. But yes, it happened that we fought, trained with Alexander, with Sergei there was Maxim Grishin, Nikita Krylov, Sergei Bilostenny. And depending on who was preparing for which fight, he chose one or another sparring partner and worked more with him.

— Let’s say your round starts against Volkov or the round against Pavlovich. What do you expect in each case?

— If you work with Sanya, he immediately starts showing, like, I’m coming to you. He senses the distance and builds a picture of the battle on this basis. And most importantly, you can expect both a punch and a kick from him. It can fly off your knee – and you’re totally focused. Standing in front of Volkov is a lost cause. This is going to sound funny, but with Volkov… if you want to fall, you have to get up. But with Seryoga everything is a little different. He comes at you, aims, but he doesn’t do it as aggressively. With Seryoga you understand that he doesn’t really kick with his legs, but a lot of danger comes from his hands. And his hands are fast. With Seryoga, it is more or less clear where he will fly from. Sanya has different angles. At the same time, Sergei can press him against the net, he can translate. And if Sergey covers, then it is much more difficult to get out from under him than from under the same Alexander Volkov.

— How to solve the problem with Alexander’s legs?

– I see it a little differently. If you prepare for a fight with a wrestler and only try to defend yourself from the fight, it’s a failure. If you want to stop someone from fighting, you either have to keep your distance or fight even better yourself. And if you don’t want to get kicked, just kick it in advance. I’m probably not that big, my weight is different from Sergei Pavlovich and Alexander Volkov, so I, for example, took the advantage. If Sanya kicked me in the body or head, I would try to kick to a lower floor and try to level it that way. In addition, lifting your leg towards your head is both more energy-consuming and takes longer. But that’s what it seems to me. The biggest problem when fighting Alexander Volkov is finding a sparring partner. There aren’t many people that big in MMA.

— Maybe Pavlovich should join the basketball team?

— Yes, but the problem is that basketball players don’t know how to shoot. They can only throw balls at them. And Seryoga even spent less than a minute on Derrick Lewis.

— How do you imagine the preparation and training of each of them, provided that this fight is announced?

– They are both mature fighters. It is unlikely that anyone will invent something new. If I were Alexander Volkov, I would continue to play to my strengths. Remote work and lots of kicking. If I were Seryoga Pavlovich, I would try not to play tag, but to throw strong punches, get into the clinch and move on from there. I think if this fight happens, it might actually be boring and end in a decision. Moreover, the decision goes all over the place. Although on paper, Alexander Volkov is now more experienced, mature, more diverse in terms of five-round fights, in terms of time spent in the octagon. And even though we’re talking about hunger, it’s still important that Sanya hasn’t fought for the belt yet. And Seryoga, no matter how it may seem, has missed his chance so far. On the other hand, he must avenge his last defeat. There he showed little – and for him it was like a bad day at work. So perhaps he wants to show that it was just an accident. And he wants to come back and get revenge quickly.

— If you look at the statistics of Sergei Pavlovich, you will see: if he does not knock out in the first minutes, the fight can last a long time. He fought Kudin and Mokhnatkin for 3 and 5 rounds. Do you have the impression that in sparring, in the second or third round, he doesn’t hit as hard as in the first?

– No, that doesn’t exist.

As I told you before, Seryoga hits hard, but carefully. If he sees a hole to hit, he will stick it there, but at the moment of contact he removes the dynamite from the blow. Thanks to him, you just understand what you missed here. It’s like he’s telling you himself: “Brother, I’m not going to stop this in battle. ” That is, Sergei does not find himself in such a situation that he runs out of gas – and immediately the knockout power, combat and variety disappear. He will be dangerous at any time.

— When you were training with a very serious group of heavyweights, did you experience any knockdowns in training?

— There have been such situations. There was often liver damage. Nikita Krylov did it well after kicking. I was hit by a guy who came with Sergei Bilostenny. I was throwing a roundhouse kick myself, and he caught me with a shorter kick, and I felt my breath taken away. When Alexey Kudin arrived, there were often knockouts. He hit hard. I told you about Alexander Volkov in a previous interview and I can repeat it now: when he hits, it’s like you’re being whipped. And of course, yes, it crashes sometimes.

— I wanted to ask you questions about their struggle. Is there a dead end here in that if Sergei Pavlovich can transfer Volkov, then in general he will not be able to act on him, choke him or take his hand? And vice versa, Volkov is unlikely to overthrow Pavlovich, but in pure wrestling he is more experienced and has better chances?

“They both wrestle and defend well on the ground, and one of them is unlikely to catch the other in a move, but if we take the skill of holding and striking, then Seryoga will have a greatest advantage due to physical strength, due to power. He really has a lot of power. We fought with Sasha and we had a lot of position changes. For example, one is trying to get into the choke and the other tries to prevent the opponent from getting into the choke. And it seemed like we were each able to do our own job. I don’t remember choking Alexander Volkov.

But again, Sanya knits very well, and it seems endless. You seem to have disconnected her hand, but you look and she reappears at work.

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