Thor Bjornsson appeared to overlook the impressive MMA debut victory of his longtime strongman rival, Eddie Hall, on Saturday night.
Hall made a dominant debut in mixed martial arts at KSW 105, quickly defeating five-time World`s Strongest Man Mariusz Pudzianowski in just 30 seconds.
Hall, known as ‘The Beast’, had previously called out Pudzianowski after participating in an unusual 2-on-1 fight last June.
Hall`s initial foray into combat sports was a boxing match against Thor Bjornsson in 2022. Although Hall knocked him down, Bjornsson, famous for his role in Game of Thrones, ultimately won that contest by decision.
Bjornsson`s Reaction to Hall`s Victory
Before the fight, Thor had publicly supported Pudzianowski to win, though he acknowledged the possibility of an upset.
“Mariusz should win due to experience, but he is getting older,” Bjornsson stated to KSW.
“Eddie might catch him with a lucky punch. We will see.”
Hall connected with several powerful shots on Pudzianowski. The Polish heavyweight later claimed on social media that some of these landed illegally on the back of his head, following his third consecutive KO defeat.
Shortly after Hall`s win concluded, Thor used his Instagram story. However, instead of mentioning Hall, he chose to highlight a different fight he had been watching.
“Fight of the Year candidate. No question,” he wrote, referring to the bout between Chris Eubank Jr and Conor Benn.
As of now, Bjornsson has not made any public comments directly addressing Hall or his striking performance in his first professional MMA bout.
Potential MMA Rematch Between Bjornsson and Hall?
A significant issue that arose after the initial Bjornsson vs. Hall boxing match was regarding payment for the event. Despite drawing enough viewers to cause the broadcaster`s systems to crash and being promised seven-figure payouts each, they reportedly never received the money.
Hall claims they were never paid and suggested Bjornsson was partly responsible. In a recent interview before his fight with Pudzianowski, the 37-year-old explained:
“I think it’s done, we had our discrepancies, he had a sore loser moment where he couldn’t take a loss and we had a fight about it.”
“Unfortunately, the wrong man won in that circumstance, but I got to punch the man in the face, which for me was a delight,” Hall continued. “He’s gone back to strongman because he’s got nothing going for him, so let him carry on.”
“I don’t think he’ll ever come back to do the rematch, so let him carry on. I`m done with that individual… I think doing business or doing sport with a man that you hate that much is a bad idea, and I just feel there were such bad omens.”
“We didn’t get paid for that fight! It was meant to be $1 million each, and it all just fell through. I think a lot of that was people just being difficult and wanting guaranteed money and not relying on pay-per-views, and I think he was a big part of that problem.”
“Just doing business with that man? I don’t want to do it. There was just too much hatred there, and there still is, and it’s not a good idea to do business, which is what the fight game is, with someone you hate that much.”
