04/10/2026
Not the night we wanted for Charlie but definitely not a total loss, losing by unanimous decision will be disappointing for him.
Charlie learned a lot about himself last night, picking himself up from the canvas and battling on against a tough opponent with solid fundamentals. He showed determination and resilience despite things not going his way. It was quite a different problem to solve last night as Charlie is usually the longer limbed fighter, so fighting a taller and longer guy with good knees and clinch presented a challenge he hadn’t really faced before.
He never really got started, but we will correct that and get him back to his usual self.
Even in defeat, there were some good points. Having been competitively fighting and training for such a short time, he has now had 9 fights. One thing we have discussed and worked on was his emotional control before and during the fight and resetting when things happen (groin strikes, getting dropped etc) and bringing himself back into the fight. He managed that last night, composed himself when he was dropped a few times with the knees and got back up. Same with the accidental low blow. Early on, that would have affected him but he managed that well.
And in the face of quite severe adversity, he continued to push, it’s easy to fight when things go your way but not many keep going when things are going poorly, at no point did he look for a way out, he got up and tried to get back on track. That is something that will carry him through tough fights.
For us as MMA guys, facing specialists in Muay Thai, K-1, boxing, Wrestling and BJJ is just a small part of building a much larger puzzle, a valuable part of his amateur development. He can now take that forward and show what he can really do in November on Supreme Championships against another tough opponent. There are no easy fights for him now as the level steps up each time.
As a team, we are very proud of his development as a martial artist. Now it’s back to the mats to prepare for November.
Congratulations to Barnaby and Mitch Fry and thanks you to CFS for allowing Charlie the opportunity to fight on your show.
