There was a pretty stark difference between the prior UFC Perth experience Tom Nolan had as compared to his most recent anecdotal happenings being on a Perth-based UFC event. Appearing on The Ariel Helwani Show, Nolan covered several subjects in the wake of his first-round rear-naked choke win over Charlie Campbell on the September 27th UFC Fight Night offering.
‘Big Train’ had previously fought in that Western Australia-based city in August 2024, when he secured a unanimous decision win over Alex Reyes. While there were similarities, insofar as he came out on the winning end of both of those MMA fights in Perth, there were also drastic differences, as Nolan said,
“Man, it was a weird fight week. It was last time here in Perth, the hotels were full of fans, the streets were full of fans, like it was; it had that real superstar sort of feel to it. This time, man, it was like a ghost town. There was no one anywhere. You could just go walk at any time anywhere you want and no one would like recognize you, nothing. It was really relaxing. To be honest, as a fighter, it was much nicer.”
“But from a fan perspective, it was kind of an eerie feeling all week. I saw they sold the tickets for like 30 dollars US or 40 dollars US at some point which it ended up packing the stadium out. Like last time when I walked out, it was probably twice as packed this time compared to last time. So there was a lot of people in there but I think purely because the tickets ended up being so cheap.”
The UFC Perth, which just happened, compared to the prior Perth-based UFC card that Nolan was on
The UFC FN instalment in Perth, which took place most recently, saw Carlos Ulberg finish Dominick Reyes in the main event. That win came by way of an emphatic knockout, which may very well have secured him the next UFC title shot at light heavyweight.
The prior Perth card Nolan fought on was UFC 305, which was headlined by a middleweight title fight between then-185-pound titleholder Dricus du Plessis and former multi-time divisional kingpin Israel Adesanya.