A dramatic appearance at Dana White’s Contender Series highlighted by a bout of appendicitis behind him, Australian Shannon Ross is among the latest fighters setting course for UFC 284 in Perth next year.
Ross was on Tuesday [AEDT] confirmed to make his UFC debut proper in the Western Australia capital, the flyweight added to the 284 card alongside the returning Jimmy Crute, who will have spent more than a year on the sidelines through injury by the time the Feb. 12 event arrives.
The Australians will join compatriots, Robert Whittaker, Tyson Pedro, Justin Tafa, Josh Culibao and Jack Jenkins in Perth, with the event now confirmed to be headlined by the Alexander Volkanovski–Islam Makhachev lightweight title fight and an interim featherweight title showdown between Yair Rodriguez and Josh Emmett.
And it could not be a more perfect scenario for Ross, with the 33-year-old at last having earned the opportunity to fight as a fulltime professional, UFC boss Dana White’s call to sign him, despite a second-round TKO loss on the Contender Series, proving a life changer.
Does he owe White, then?
“I feel like I owe them and I also feel like that the way I went over there and persevered through everything I went through, I feel like I was owed that chance to give myself another shot at the same time as well,” Ross told ESPN.
“Because I know that 99% of people, if they’d gone through what I’d gone through with appendicitis, they might have called the doctor during fight week and got it checked. But I kept it to myself, I got to the fight and made weight, I did everything that was I obliged to do, and now I get to do it again but this time I’ll get to do it healthy.
“So let’s see if we can even the score with the Brazilians.”
After impressing in the first round against Vinicius Salvador, demonstrating his toughness and determination to twice get up after the Brazilian had knocked him to the floor, Ross was eventually stopped late in the second.
But such had been the combat, the fight earned a rare standing ovation from White.
In the days that followed, and news that Ross had suffered a bout of appendicitis filtered out, the Australian earned even more respect for his gutsy display inside the Octagon.
“The fight camp preparations weren’t too bad at all, they all went to plan,” Ross explained of his Contender Series appearance. “It was just once we were flying out [to Las Vegas], there was just a bit of that belly pain there and that was when the inflammation started.
“So it was pretty much just the fight week, when you’re slowly toning down the intensity anyway, it wasn’t significantly setting me back in any way but I think my body was crying out for some help. That was the biggest thing, and cutting the weight with it, but it was just a weird feeling. But we got it done, we made weight and we got to the fight, and now we get to do it without all that stuff. I can’t get appendicitis twice, so that’s pretty good.
“I had it surgically removed in Vegas and I’m pretty sure it was the morning of the fight when it ruptured. I was having a little warm-up in the morning with my team, just doing some drills, and I got a little pain in my abdomen in the morning. And by the time we got to hospital the next day I had full septicemia in my bloodstream and blood poisoning and that was from it rupturing.”
With that dramatic experience now behind him, Ross has committed himself completely to life as a UFC fighter — something he simply wasn’t in a position to do beforehand.
The perspective that comes with having to grind all the way to the age of 33, and deal with the appendicitis hurdle to boot, before earning a shot at the UFC, means there is no way Ross will be taking his newfound professionalism for granted.
“I’ve been fighting and dedicating myself to this sport for a third of my life now, so that’s a pretty big span. And in the same instance, working the whole way through. It felt like a couple of years ago I could have got a call-up, but with everything that happened with COVID, all the lockdowns, that set us back to now,” Ross told ESPN.
“But I feel a lot more confident where I am in life now to give the proper best version of me. Maybe five or seven years ago, when you’re in your mid-20s, I think people maybe overlook the chance they get or they don’t give it all when they could, whereas where I am at I have to give it my all.
“I feel like I’ve worked twice as hard as anyone who’s got a contract from Australia; 20 pro fights, I’ve probably had the most fights of anyone before I’ve got a call-up. It’s been a grind, but I think it has made be a little bit wiser in my approach to the sport and now we get a good run of wins together and aim for the top.”
And then there’s the opportunity for Ross to join a rich UFC legacy on Australian soil, which is seeing mixed martial arts go from strength to strength Down Under.
“I’ve been to a fair few of the cards in Australia; I’ve been to Big Foot (Antonio Silva)-Mark Hunt in Brisbane, to the Izzy and Whittaker fight, I went to Adelaide [in 2018], I’ve been to a few,” Ross said. “And obviously the impact these shows have on this region, every time it happens the local scene in the sport just grows and it jumps another notch.
“People want to train and fight, so it’s awesome that the UFC comes down here. The Australian fans love it and they always sell the shows out, so I think it works both ways.”