Tom Aspinall will undergo knee surgery after a freak injury ended his fight with Curtis Blaydes at UFC London after just 15 seconds.
Surging heavyweight Aspinall was looking to push himself one step closer to a title shot against perennial contender Blaydes last weekend, but the fight was over in seconds when Aspinall blew his knee out after throwing a leg kick. The 29-year-old went down in pain straight after landing the kick, clutching his knee in pain as the fight was waved off.
Four days on from the fight, Aspinall released an update video addressing his horror injury. The heavyweight revealed he will undergo surgery next week but is still unclear on the diagnosis of his injury. "Just a quick update on the knee situation because plenty of people are is asking about the diagnosis and what happened to the knee," he said.
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"Anybody who has got knee problems knows that in order to have an accurate MRI scan you need to let the swelling go down. I spoke to the surgeon and we have a rough idea of what it is, but we are currently waiting for the swelling to go down.
"I will be having the MRI this weekend and having surgery early next week in London. Just want to say a massive thank you to everyone who has reached out, obviously I've been offline and down in the dumps since Saturday night but hopefully we'll get it fixed and get the surgery early next week."
Aspinall's injury marked the second fight in as many months to be stopped due to a leg break after Aleksandar Rakic blew his knee out just weeks ago in his main event clash against former 205lb world champion Jan Blachowicz. Much like Aspinall, top light-heavyweight Rakic was forced to undergo surgery for his injury.
Aspinall was unbeaten in the UFC heading into his fight with Blaydes, last submitting Alexander Volkov at The O2 arena in March. The Brit praised Blaydes for being a "true gentleman" as the pair bonded over a post-fight beer following his injury. "Want to thank Curtis for being a true gentleman," Aspinall wrote. "It didn’t work out how we both wanted, but to come and see me after for a beer makes you a legend in my eyes. Finally, my team and my family. We all know this is elite sport, we live to fight another day!"
