Arnold Allen on Potential Calvin Kattar Matchup: ‘I Think I’m the Better Boxer’

Raise the stakes, and Arnold Allen promises that he’ll only keep getting better.

The Englishman won his ninth consecutive bout in the UFC Fight Night 204 co-main event, stopping former lightweight contender Dan Hooker via TKO at the 2:33 mark of Round 1 in their 145-pound clash at the O2 Arena in London on Saturday. After a run of four straight decision wins, Allen knew it was important to make a statement. That he did, going toe-to-toe with one of the sport’s renowned action fighters and winning a firefight in emphatic fashion.

“It’s huge. To be honest, I know I’m a finisher,” Allen said at the post-fight press conference. “I know I’m a decision guy really, I’m pretending now, but I’ve got the power in my hands. All my coaches tell me I hit hard, I put people down with body shots in sparring. It just doesn’t come out in the fight. I think the kind of style of opponents I’ve fought haven’t allowed me to fight that way. I nearly had it in the last fight (vs. Sodiq Yusuff), but then I broke my baby hands and that didn’t happen.

“I always said the better guys I fight, the better I’m going to show up. He’s the best guy I’ve fought. He’s the most dangerous guy by a country mile – physically, his skill set, he’s long as anything.”

That said, Allen isn’t so sure that Hooker isn’t better off returning to lightweight. “The Hangman” had mixed results early in his UFC tenure at featherweight before moving to 155 pounds. He returned to featherweight after losing three of four in the Octagon to the likes of Islam Makhachev, Michael Chandler and Dustin Poirier.

“I personally didn’t think it was the best choice,” Allen said of the move. “If anything, someone like that, going up maybe again would be a good idea, but he knows his body, he knows how he feels. But yeah, I think his best work’s at lightweight. Not a knock at him or anything obviously, but I don’t think making that extra cut is a good choice.”

Allen isn’t quite ready for a title shot in a crowded division, so he made the use of his microphone time – both in the cage and at the press conference – to angle for a clash with Calvin Katter. It’s a stylistic matchup that he believes favors him.

“I want to be in the top five and I think he’s top five,” Allen said. “That’s a fight that would put me there. We got offered that fight for a main event spot last year or earlier in the year, but I was out with injury. I think it works really good. He’s less tall than (Hooker), so that works out. He’s predominantly a boxer, I’m predominantly a boxer, so it’s a fan-friendly fight. I think I’m the better boxer.”

According to UFC president Dana White, Allen has earned the right to call his shot.

“Who he just beat tonight and the way that he beat him …he got in there and went right to war with Hooker,” White said. “Stood in the pocket, didn’t back down and literally destroyed him. It’s unbelievable. He’s ready for anything now. Tonight we found out where that kid’s really at.”