Jesse Arnett stops Ali Al Qaisi to win UAE Warriors featherweight title

Jesse Arnett was crowned the new UAE Warriors featherweight champion on Saturday after a second round stoppage by the cage-side doctor following a cut above Ali Al Qaisi’s left eye.

Chaos ensued as a visibly upset Al Qaisi screamed at the referee and went after Arnett, who had to jump out of the cage before calmness was restored at the Etihad Arena.

“I love Abu Dhabi and I love to compete, and I respect Ali and everyone in this region,” Arnett said. “Ali deserves an immediate re-match. This fight was razor-close and I landed an elbow from the top and split him wide open. I’m not the referee but I’m here to compete and I was there for all five rounds.

“Everybody that knows me back home knows I haven’t had a lot of wrestling practice and I haven’t had a lot of jiu-jitsu practice since I left Sanford MMA. I will wrestle that boy next time and do the exact same thing. I found the game-plan to beat Ali.”

After an evenly-matched opening round, Al Qaisi attempted a high kick and fell on his back, allowing Arnett to get on top of his opponent to open what appeared to be a deep cut.

Al Qaisi looked agitated with the decision to stop the contest. He argued with the referee first and then pursued Arnett when he appeared to intervene on the verdict.

The result took Arnett’s win-loss record to 20-8 and his UAE Warriors record to 3-1.

Ali Taleb took his unbeaten record to seven with a stunning right hook to floor defending champion Vinicius de Oliveira in the UAE Warriors bantamweight title contest.

De Oliveira produced an impressive second round after a close opening five minutes, but walked into Taleb’s crunching right that landed on his right jaw in the third round.

“I was confident coming into this title contest,” Taleb said after