How Petr Yan Solved Merab Dvalishvili
Or: how I learned to stop worrying and trust Petr Yan
When Petr Yan won the UFC Bantamweight title only five years into his career, he looked untouchable. His only loss an early battle against a quality opponent in Magomed Magomedov, later avenged dominantly, he forged a trail of devastation through the UFC Bantamweight division that brought him from debut to championship in two short years. But the Yan era slipped through the cracks even quicker than it arrived. While delivering a dominant beating to Aljamain Sterling in his first title defense, Yan committed what would become one of the sport’s most infamous goofs when he landed an illegal knee and got himself disqualified.
The DQ loss to Sterling should have been a mere speed bump in Yan’s rise - when a rematch failed to materialize due to a Sterling injury, he proved he was better than ever with a win over a game Cory Sandhagen. Finally slated to fight Sterling once more, the title was once again as good as Yan’s. He already proved he had what it took to dominate Sterling, what’s one more time? But it wasn’t to be. Sterling learned his lessons from their first fight and put on the performance of a lifetime, securing the first round with higher output, maximizing his control on the ground to dominate the middle rounds, and holding out late against a resurgent Yan for a split decision.
After the second Sterling loss, everything seemed to spiral out of control. Another split decision loss to up-and-coming contender, Sean O’Malley, that most viewers saw for Yan. There were calls of robbery, but for the second time in a row, Yan’s workrate let him down, as he failed to distinguish his offense and left himself playing catch up after early hesitation. But the worst was yet to come for Petr Yan.
Yan was on a two fight skid, but his elite talent shone through in both losing performances. A couple different bounces in a couple different rounds, and he could easily be making his fifth title defense. But Merab Dvalishvili would soon put that fantasy to rest. Dvalishvili not only handed Yan his third consecutive loss, he bullied Yan around the Octagon, overwhelming him with pace, pressure, and offensive volume. Not a single judge saw Yan winning even one round.
His first fight with Dvalishvili could have put Yan right back into title contention, but instead it thrust him into a slower rebuild. He wouldn’t fight until nearly a year later, winning a decision over Song Yadong that felt too close for comfort. His next couple fights against Deiveson Figueiredo and Marcus McGhee felt like lateral moves at best, but he turned in more commanding performances that still lacked the devastation and damage of his earlier run.
In the meantime, Dvalishvili kept busy cleaning out the Bantamweight division ahead of Yan. He won five straight after their fight, capturing the title from Sean O’Malley and defending it against Sandhagen and Umar Nurmagomedov. Yan found himself in the position Aljamain Sterling once occupied, coming into a rematch against a nightmare matchup that made him look helpless in their first contest. And just like Sterling, Yan turned in the performance of a lifetime, delivering a classic Yan beating against all odds.
To understand what made Yan’s performance so special, we must first discuss the factors that make Dvalishvili such a difficult fight for him to navigate. Yan is one of the craftiest pressure fighters in the sport, but he’s always been better at covering distance and keeping up with a retreating opponent than forcing them backwards. Yan is a defensively-minded striker and his primary methods of defense involve using his forearms or extended arms to cover his chin. So his counters mostly arrive delayed, rather than simultaneous to his opponent’s offense, and he prefers to give ground and re-engage over planting his feet and countering on the spot.
Yan’s willingness to throw up a high guard and retreat has caused problems with fighters who can seize the initiative from him - Sterling was able to busy him with enough empty volume early to throw off his offense, while building setups to take him down later. Anyone who struggles with initiative is going to have a hell of a time beating Merab Dvalishvili.
Dvalishvili attacks primarily in bursts and blitzes, but his endless cardio means that the bursts never stop coming, and his opponents never get a chance to rest or comfortably set their feet. He maintains a long distance, feinting back and forth outside immediate jabbing range, and covers it by launching himself head first into long right hands.
Dvalishvili’s willingness to throw himself off balance makes his rear hand quite a bit longer than it appears at the cost of his own stance. He’ll also throw in a couple basic mixups to keep opponents guessing, initiating it with a lead hook or hand trap, and running through into southpaw with a left hook as opponents backtrack.
It’s easy to see why Yan would have trouble advancing against someone like Dvalishvili, but what truly ties Dvalishvili’s game together is the way his striking sets up his takedowns. The motion of his long right hand also doubles as a penetration step for his takedowns, and because he’s covering so much ground with it, he can very quickly get in on the hips in great position to finish.
When Dvalishvili’s opponents see him bending his knees and heaving himself toward them a hundred miles an hour, there’s no way to tell if he’s looking to punch them in the face or grab a leg. You have to respect the right hand, or you’ll eat power punches all night, but if you straighten up or back away from it, he’ll duck in on your hips and knock you over like a bowling pin. It’s a natural response to such a long right hand to move away from it and start shifting weight backwards, but that allows Dvalishvili’s momentum to run through you if he shoots, as the feet need to remain firmly planted to hip in and halt the shot’s momentum.
This simple mixup makes Dvalishvili one of the biggest open-space takedown threats in MMA, and he can spam it over and over again until his opponents exhaust themselves physically and mentally trying to defend. This might seem like the same old “wrestler with an overhand right” setup, but you’re underestimating how much distance Dvalishvili closes with his and how that threat compromises his opponent’s positioning.
In their first fight, Dvalishvili’s cleanest takedowns, where he was able to strike directly into a finish without having to work through a long chain wrestling sequence, came mostly when he made Yan react to the threat of his right hand. Yan would throw his guard high, then get caught with his posture upright and with weight on his heels.
In the rematch, Yan built his approach around avoiding that position, making Dvalishvili struggle through every takedown attempt he could muster.
Yan needed a way to prevent Dvalishvili from backing him off at will and apply more consistent offense at mid-range. He found the perfect tool early in a dipping jab, spearing Dvalishvili with stinging jabs while maintaining a fold in his rear hip, or proactively ducking low after landing.