Volkanovski backs Pereira’s illegal-strikes complaint, estimates 10-plus back-of-head shots

SYDNEY, NEW SOUTH WALES, AUSTRALIA – Volk in action at UFC 325
(Source: Zuffa LLC / Getty Images)

Alexander Volkanovski has lent his voice to the post-fight conversation around Alex Pereira’s interim heavyweight title loss to Ciryl Gane, agreeing that illegal strikes to the back of the head went unaddressed during the bout and putting a specific number on what he saw.

Gane stopped Pereira by TKO at 1:27 of the second round in the co-main event of UFC Freedom 250 on June 14, claiming the interim heavyweight title for the second time in his career and ending Pereira’s bid to become the first three-division UFC champion. Pereira, now 13-4 in his heavyweight debut, has spent the days since the fight criticising referee Herb Dean for failing to warn Gane about strikes Pereira says landed on the back of his head during the finishing sequence. He has also posted photos to social media of visible lumps on the back of his head, has publicly called for Dean to retire, has indicated he will appeal the result through his management at ToughMedia Corp., and, in recent comments, hinted he is considering retirement after the loss.

Volkanovski, reviewing the fight on his YouTube channel, made the case Pereira’s complaint has substance.

“I’m talking more than 10 shots to the back of the head, maybe, because it was clear watching it live, very clear,” the featherweight champion said. “Was there back-of-the-head shots? Yes, there was. Could there be a different outcome if you hurt Pereira, because he was obviously doing the right stuff to recover, so he’s on his way to recover until there was a lot of other shots and I explained where I thought them shots were landing. Then he was getting wobbled and wobbled. And you get direct contact on the brain like this, so that’s going to be hard to recover from.”

The mechanical detail of his breakdown is the part worth sitting with. Volkanovski’s position is that Pereira was holding Gane’s leg with his head pressed high against the Frenchman’s thigh, which made clean legal shots almost impossible for Gane to land. Gane, in Volkanovski’s reading, was not intentionally targeting the back of the head but was forced into that area by positioning he could not work around. The complaint is about Dean, not Gane.

“I’m not saying Gane did it on purpose,” Volkanovski said. “Herb, I love you, mate, but I feel like you should have been pretty vocal, watch the back of the head. I remember looking and seeing a couple of them and he wasn’t. He’s not even telling him to watch the back of the head, I’m like, what’s going on here?”

Volkanovski also acknowledged he was holding back. “I don’t want to throw shade on people, but I mean, there was a lot of back-of-the-head shots. A lot of them. To be honest, if it was someone I didn’t like that did that, I’d probably be a lot more clear with how I’m saying this, because there was a lot of them.”

The 28-4 Australian is the long-reigning featherweight champion and was the UFC men’s pound-for-pound No. 1 prior to his loss to Ilia Topuria at UFC 298 in February 2024. He has not lost since, reclaiming the vacant featherweight title with a unanimous decision over Diego Lopes at UFC 314 in April 2025 and defending it in their rematch at UFC 325 in Sydney in January.

He was not the only public voice agreeing with Pereira this week. UFC CEO Dana White, at the UFC Vegas 119 post-fight press conference on Saturday, said Dean should have at least tried to call out the fouls, even if a full stoppage was a separate question. Jorge Masvidal went further, calling Dean “the worst referee in MMA.” Pereira’s complaint has moved from a single-fighter grievance into a broader argument about Dean’s officiating, with Pereira himself confirming he will block Dean from refereeing any of his future fights.

Volkanovski’s reading is more measured than the harsher voices but consistent on the underlying point. A verbal warning, in his view, would have changed Gane’s approach and possibly given Pereira a chance to survive. “Maybe if Herb was saying, watch the back of the head, he would have maybe thought, oh, I didn’t realise I was hitting him there, and maybe he would try better to get around. Could there be a different outcome if you hurt Pereira, because he was obviously doing the right stuff to recover.”

Pereira’s track record on recovery is part of the argument. Israel Adesanya wobbled him in the first round of their UFC 281 meeting before Pereira finished him later in the fight. Khalil Rountree dropped him at UFC 307 before Pereira regained control and stopped him in the fourth. The “I would have recovered” claim isn’t theoretical for him.

The back-of-the-head rule has long been one of the most inconsistently applied provisions in the Unified Rules of MMA. The accepted definition covers a narrow strip along the centreline from the crown to the base of the skull, what officials sometimes describe using the “mohawk” reference. In practice, referees retain significant discretion over when contact in that zone is incidental, when it warrants a verbal warning, and when it justifies a point deduction or stoppage. High-stakes title fights tend to amplify the scrutiny rather than resolve it.

Pereira has continued to press the issue across his own channels, and Volkanovski’s comments suggest the discussion is unlikely to fade quickly. Any formal review of the result is procedurally unusual because UFC Freedom 250 was not sanctioned by a state athletic commission. The event was held on federal property, which under Association of Boxing Commissions president Timothy Shipman meant the UFC was not required to select a state body. The D.C. Combat Sports Commission was bypassed after the UFC declined to pay its $100 permit fee. The ABC instead served as the sanctioning authority on a one-off basis, assembling judges, referees, and inspectors. Whether ABC has the procedural framework to formally review a stoppage and overturn a result, or whether any such review would have to be routed differently, has not been publicly clarified. ToughMedia Corp. has confirmed they are exploring all grounds for an appeal.

Gane, for his part, has not engaged with the complaints in detail beyond pointing to the finish itself. The interim title now sets up an expected unification bout with undisputed champion Tom Aspinall, who has verbally accepted a UFC Paris booking for September 5 contingent on his eye-surgery recovery and the ongoing contract dispute between his manager Eddie Hearn and the UFC.

For Pereira, the loss was his heavyweight debut. A return to light heavyweight has been floated by analysts as a possible next move, though Pereira has not confirmed his next step and has hinted publicly at retirement in the past several days. Volkanovski closed his breakdown by suggesting the issue is bigger than one fight. The footage from UFC Freedom 250, frame by frame, is now part of a longer argument about how the back-of-the-head rule is enforced when a championship is on the line, and who carries the cost when it isn’t.