Athletes
Youssef Zalal Is Bringing The Energy
Featherweight Youssef Zalal Is Pumped And Looking For A Strong Finish Against Jarno Errens This Weekend In Las Vegas
It doesn’t take long to like Youssef Zalal. The 145-pound prospect has a good energy, is quick with a laugh, and generally sounds enthused about the prospect of spending a few Saturday nights a year getting into a fistfight.
But for all the positive vibes he brings, when he returned to the UFC in March, after nearly two years on the regional circuit, there was a little bit of an edge, and a heavyweight-sized chip on this featherweight’s shoulder.
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“I have a chip on my shoulder because I want to go perform,” said Zalal, who submitted Billy Quarantillo in his first trip to the Octagon since 2022. “I'm putting the pressure on myself to go perform and I know that for me to perform, I have to do all the work that’s necessary to get that done. You have to be in shape, you have to have the game plan, you have to have a lot of things. So that's the thing that motivates me. And I think I showed it last fight. I feel like there was a lot of pressure - from two weeks’ notice to facing a guy that was almost ranked.”
There’s more. Many believed that after posting a 3-3-1 record in his first seven UFC bouts from 2020 to 2022, Zalal should have remained on the roster, but that wasn’t the case, leaving him to work his way back to the big show. And he did just that, with three wins and three finishes earning him a short notice call to face Quarantillo and make a statement.
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“My whole plan was to go finish this kid and then go to (UFC matchmaker) Sean Shelby and say, ‘I told you this is the right time and I told you I'm back for vengeance.’ And that's exactly what I did. After my fight, I was walking to see the doctor and Sean Shelby was walking in. I shook his hand, and I was like, ‘Thank you again. I appreciate you for the opportunity, but I told you I'm back and I told you this is the time.’ And he was like, ‘You are a hundred percent correct. This is the time and I'm glad we did it.’”
Zalal beams, a 27-year-old on top of his game and on top of the world as he prepares for a Saturday meeting with Jarno Ennis. It’s a good test for both, but you could have matched “The Moroccan Devil” with Jon Jones and he would have signed on the dotted line. That’s the difference between fighters and the rest of us, and sometimes that’s tough to explain to family and friends that don’t know the inner workings of the business.
“The crazy part is I don't think they know it fully,” said Zalal of his support system’s reaction to the last couple years. “But my family's always been there for me, and they supported me through ups and downs. It was super tough to represent a family and a country and all that stuff, and then you're cut, because not a lot of people come back when they get cut. So, for me to go prove myself that I’m capable of this and to prove to my family and to my country that I am one of the best in the world and I will be the best in the world, that's big to me.”
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If you haven’t figured it out by now, Zalal plans on staying a while the second time around.
“The goal for me is how can I finish better?” he said. “Obviously, winning is very important in the UFC. You have to win just to keep you in the conversation of not being cut and being able to climb the rankings. But you go finish, you climb up the rankings a lot higher than most people are. So my biggest challenge to myself is how can I get a better finish next fight? And the biggest goal? As a young kid, I always said I want to be a world champion, but I feel like mentally I was just not there at all. I was just relied on the fame and oh, you're in the UFC, you're in this, you're in that. I know who I am, I know what I want and obviously I want that guy that I fought already and I want to fight again.”
UFC Fight Night: Tybura vs Spivac 2 took place live from UFC APEX in Las Vegas, Nevada on August 10, 2024. See the final Prelim & Main Card results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses - and relive the action on UFC Fight Pass!
