Igor, in a conversation with Tim Bresnan, you called his loss to Rustam Babayev on fouls “strange”. This definition is not very similar to the constructive analysis of the match you usually do. Please tell us what did you mean?

Firstly, I am not the only one to whom this match, in which none of the athletes have managed to pin his opponent, seemed, to put it mildly, unusual. For me, his “oddity” is primarily how far the result contrasts with the skill and level of the participants. Usually, losing by fouls is a consequence of the inexperience of an athlete, lack of work at the table. In this situation, it is difficult to call any of the participants not experienced enough. Therefore, this match is of great interest from the point of view of sports science and is subject to detailed analysis. Blaming refereeing on all would be incorrect.

But users of social networks have a slightly different opinion. Most argue that the referee was overly picky.

From the point of view of following the “letter of the law”, I have no complaints about the referee of this fight. The level of the match, the general atmosphere in the room, the nature of the foul situations, the need to instantly make a decision, simply did not leave room for any compromises.

What do you mean by the “nature of the foul situations”?

To begin with, the fouls, which decided the outcome of the fight, were of two types. Those were public’s favorite elbow fouls, as well as fouls associated with the grip setup - a violation of the referee’s grip and an early start.

As for elbow fouls, everything is more or less simple. Violation can always be checked on video from the elbow cameras. Despite Tim's experience, elbow fouls occasionally play a cruel joke with him.

For example, in 2016, Tim, having arrived on the Zloty Tur with a firm intention to win, could not even make to the semi-finals because of elbow fouls. After that failure, he made conclusions and several subsequent matches he managed to control his elbows. In general, I believe that today many have forgotten that an important part of technical training, besides pulling styles, is elbow control. As soon as the arm moves away from the body, stops sliding along it and moving with it, it becomes difficult for an athlete to control it. This often happens when the athlete is too confident in the strength of his hand.

In the case of fouls associated with the grip setup and start, everything is much more complicated. Much harder for the referee.

In the Devon Larratt duel against Denis Tsyplenkov, we saw that Devon was trying to apply an early start strategy, relying on Denis's instant reaction, which would hide this maneuver and make Denis waste energy. But Denis did not react to this and Devon got fouls for an early start.

Judging by what Tim told us in an interview, Rustam used the same strategy, and Tim, unlike Denis, instantly responded to Rustam's minimal movement. The result - a foul for Tim's early start. And only when Tim decided to stay in the center and not rush to attack, he managed to emerge victorious in the last two rounds. In this case, it is very difficult for the referee to assess the situation and the decision is based on obvious facts.

With such a big difference in the weight of rivals, it is not difficult to understand why Rustam had to use strategic tricks in order to offer serious resistance to Tim Bresnan.

The past Vendetta has shown many cases for analysis and conclusions so that the preparation of athletes for fights of such a high level would be of higher quality in the future.