Geoff Neal wants a “slobber knocker” of a fight against Ian Machado Garry at UFC 298

By Cole Shelton - February 14, 2024

Geoff Neal is looking to cause chaos at UFC 298 and make his fight against Ian Machado Garry a wild one.

Geoff Neal

Neal is set to face Garry in a rescheduled bout after the two were supposed to fight back in August. Neal was forced to pull out of their initial booking with an injury, and according to ‘Handz of Steel’ the Irishman wasn’t originally keen on rebooking the fight.

“I mean pretty disappointing, especially having the camp that I did, it was a real good camp. Having to pull out of a fight you also have to pull out of making money too, so that was not good. I’m glad I got the fight back. He didn’t want to fight me at first again, he pretty much said there was no point in rescheduling the fight, but whatever reason it got rescheduled so I’m grateful to get this one back,” Neal said on Just Scrap Radio on BJPENN.com.

After their original fight was scratched, Garry took aim at Neal calling him scared, which he says isn’t the case at all.

“I fight for a living, me being scared is laughable. Nobody in the UFC is scared, if you are scared you aren’t going to last long. At the end of the day, we have a date, February 17 so we are going to see who’s scared when we step into the cage,” Neal said

Ultimately, Geoff Neal enters his UFC 298 fight with a ton of confidence as he believes he can force Ian Machado Garry to not be technical and get into a brawl. Along with that, Neal expects to put the pressure on Garry and not let him dictate the pace, which he believes will lead to a stoppage win at UFC 298.

“It’s going to be a high pace, I’m going to put the pace on him. I haven’t seen him in a real slobber knocker, so we will see if we can take the fight there and see how he reacts to it… I plan on taking him out in the second round and if not, it will be three rounds of me controlling the fight and dominating,” Neal said.

Should Geoff Neal get a stoppage win at UFC 298 he isn’t sure what will be next for him, but knows it will help boost up his profile.

“We will see, I know it will boost my name,” Neal concluded. “I’m ranked eighth or something and not a lot of people follow me or know me. After I get through this fight I should get a pretty big pop.”