Justin Gaethje wasn't a fan of his 2021 Fight of the Year against Michael Chandler and has labelled the fight "boring".
In arguably one of the best three-round fights in UFC history, Gaethje won a unanimous decision against Chandler at UFC 268 last November.
They attempted over 400 significant strikes between them over 15 minutes with Gaethje scoring the only knockdown of the fight in the second round.
The win has likely earned Gaethje a shot at UFC lightweight champion Charles Oliveira next, who defended his belt against Dustin Poirier at UFC 269 last December.
And Gaethje was frustrated with his performance against Chandler as he wanted to knock him out.
“To be completely honest with you, I feel like that was kind of a boring fight when I was in there,” Gaethje told BT Sport.
“Yeah, it just makes no sense. It’s the first time I’ve ever wanted to win more than to knock somebody out. So yeah, it was not good. I didn’t like it.
"I want to go back to just wanting to hurt somebody and finish them. But now that I have won and I got my title shot, I can go back to how it should be.”
Gaethje will hope to fight for the lightweight title for the second time in his UFC career next, falling short on his first shot at the belt in 2020 against Khabib Nurmagomedov.
'The Highlight' had knocked out all four of his opponents in the lead up to that fight, which included the likes of Tony Ferguson and Donald Cerrone.
But he was choked out for the first time in his career at UFC 254 with Nurmagomedov later vacating the title and retiring from fighting.
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Oliveira won Nurmagomedov's vacated title last May when he knocked out Chandler and the Brazilian will defend the belt for the second time in his next bout.
With Gaethje confident the promotion will head to Brazil for UFC 274 on May 7, he wants to fight Oliveira on the card and would relish the chance of competing in "enemy territory".
"Nothing's been signed or promised, other than what you've heard and I've heard," he said of a fight with Oliveira.
“I want to go down to Brazil, I want to fight in the chaos. If you go back and listen to my early interviews, I said I wanted to go to the enemy territory like Brazil and fight in that chaos.
"So them screaming ‘I’m gonna die,’ 20,000 people, I am 100 per cent confident that when I’m done, they’ll love me.”
