Neil Seery wants to “fight as soon as possible”, eyes January return

Last weekend, UFC flyweight Neil Seery discussed his recovery from the fractured rib that ruled him out of his November 8^th bout with Richie Vaculik, claiming that he would be back to training this week.

“It’s not too bad, I got back training this week and hopefully I’ll be able to get back sparring in the next few weeks,” said Seery at BattleZone 12.

“I got the all clear on Friday so I can go back to work. I’ve been back running, I did a good bit of that last week. I’ll just get myself back to work, back in to full training and everything should be good to go.”

Seery revealed that he had tested the rib’s reaction to some light grappling training with Ryano prospect Jack Sheridan who won by flying knee in his amateur bout at last weekend’s event at the Regency Hotel.

He said: “I actually jumped in with Jack Sheridan during the week. He’s light and wiry so when I was up in the gym on Friday I went in for a few rolls with him. The stretching seems to have done it more good than bad. I had a good stretch, a bit of rolling and I went for a run and it actually felt a lot better. I’m hoping that the damage isn’t that bad.”

With every other active Irish UFC fighter currently matched for January 18’s TD Garden date, Seery maintained that although it would be “great” to get on to the card, he would take any fight that comes up once he has had a solid six weeks of sparring under his belt in preparation.

“Look, it would be great to be on that Boston card, but really I just want to get on any card at this stage. It’s just about getting back to sparring again, I don’t know when I will be able to do that.

“As far as things like, rolling, running and getting my fitness back up – there is no problem there. It’s just the impact end of it that we have to wait and see. They reckoned it would take six weeks and this is the fourth week, so in two more weeks I should be back sparring.

“So for two weeks I should be able to get the fitness going and then I’ll be able to ease back into the sparring.

“By January I’ll definitely be ready. I don’t really care about Christmas. Obviously it’s going to have to stop this year, I won’t be drinking and I won’t be eating. It’s been done before for the likes of the Cage Warriors cards.

“If there’s a fight there in January I know what I will have to do. I really want to get in there and fight as soon as possible so I just have to do what I have to do.”

@PetesyCarroll