After 21 months without action that included two fights he had to pull out of, James Gallagher finally made the walk again Friday.
What Gallagher (12-2 MMA, 9-2 BMMA) got from James Gonzalez (10-7 MMA, 1-2 BMMA) was a stiff test – perhaps stiffer than he expected – but he escaped Sioux Falls, S.D., with a split decision on the main card at Bellator 198 for his first win since October 2020.
“(It was a) very hard fight – bad performance. But I did what I had to do and I won. That’s the main thing,” Gallagher said at his post-fight news conference. “I’ve got a lot to learn, a lot to grow, a lot to improve. It was a tough, tough fight, but I was calm. I won the first two rounds, and then I just coasted the last one. That’s not usually my style. I don’t fight like that, and I don’t perform like that. But, I had to do what I had to do. I came through what I had to come through. Winners f*cking win.
“It feels good. I’m back in that position no matter how it was, and that’s the beautiful thing about this game is that you can lose in spectacular fashion and blow the roof off the place, and you can win in not-so-good fashion the way I won tonight. But at the end of the day, I’m back in that position and nothing else f*cking matters. Not one thing. They tried to keep me out of this game for a long time. I’ve been battling for two years now to get back, and I’m f*cking back.”
Gallagher, a brash fighter from Dublin, said if fellow Bellator 298 winner Leandro Higo wants to fight at Bellator 299 in Dublin next month, he’s ready. Gallagher was matched up Higo with for March, but had to pull out of his second straight fight.
But one fighter he doesn’t have a lot of interest in a matchup with is Danny Sabatello. Part of the reason is because Gallagher fought Friday at featherweight after years at 135 pounds, and he doesn’t seem keen on making that cut again.
But Gallagher also said he probably wouldn’t jibe well with Sabatello’s personality.
“If he wants to come up 145, the fight’s there,” Gallagher said. “But I don’t think he’s going to do that. To be honest, I couldn’t listen to that little f*cking clown for f*cking six weeks. Man, that would be … Fighting him? No problem. Fighting him is no problem. But ‘meh meh meh meh meh meh meh meh’ – stop! That’d just give you a f*cking headache. So yeah, I’ll take the fight – but not the headache.”
Check out Gallagher’s full post-fight interview in the video above.
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for Bellator 298.
