Belal Muhammad's prime is already behind him — and we all know it's time to accept the harsh truth!

Watched that Edwards fight on my phone in the gym, Belal came out of the gate like a man possessed—then just… bogged down. Costa? Classic Paulo: he stuck to his rhythm, landed the same straight left over and over until Belal forgot how to load it. But let's not bury him just yet—fact is, every top welter's got black marks in their resume.

So who’s the one sitting on a dead stack of chips then eh? 😤 Leon Edwards was out there dancing with some dude from Luton last week, Paulo Costa got stopped by Edwards’ corner-man himself in 2021 — they’re just names that ping on the scoreboard to make us feel old! Belal walked into BOTH those hell-pits with 18 months of UFC gold pinned to his chest and left with a smile that said “I belong”, while the refs *just* couldn’t see the lights out cos the elbows were flying round his head like leaf-blower mode… THAT’S heart, THAT’S guts, not some “prime disappeared through the back door” rubbish the armchair philosophers are peddling. The gearbox’s fine, lads — the whole bloody show’s still on the road!

Edwards wasn’t dancing with some Luton lad because he’d just stuffed Belal into the meat locker, remember? That December 2023 card in London—Leon’s first defence after snatching the strap from Kamaru—was still fresh enough that people at the warehouse gym were replaying every second when Costa took the cage. Same calendar stretch, same weight class, same breathless hype you’ve both crammed into your headphones each week for years. Two different assassins with the same blueprint: tight jab to set the pace, then switch-hit the power straight when the target starts flinching. Belal walked in with a belt on his waist and a game plan in his pocket—classic titleholder chess—yet both men carved him up before the judges could blink. That’s not “bad luck” or “leaf-blower elbows”; that’s two of the sharpest strikers in the game making mincemeat out of a man they’d both studied on tape for months. The chip stack wasn’t empty when he sat down—it was blistered by the time he stood up.

you ever watch kelly richards carve up seans of top welterweights back in 2006 when the division was just bristling with left hands and body kicks you felt like you were watching a fucking clinic every thursday night belal at that stadium park in manchester back in 2019 he looked like the next iteration of that same kind of artisan you could tell right away he was stitching his fights together like a tailor not a brawler and all of a sudden here we are hashing over two losses that feel like the moment the tape got snagged and the reel started to drag. i remember when rory macdonald turned around to the press after that third edition against demian maia and said he wasn't scared of dying he was scared of getting old and losing without meaning and that's the vibe i get off these two fights in london the lights weren't flickering because the skill ran out they just froze for three seconds too long and two men who had studied every clip of him patiently picked the lock and walked out with the keys. edwards didn't come from luton with a wand he came off a five-round war against kamaru usman where he was out on his feet and still landed that flying knee at the buzzer to cement the strap that's the kind of currency you walk into a cage with not some taxi driver's cash and costa by then was already operating like a heat-seeking missile knowing exactly where to plant his lead foot so belal's chessboard got dismantled before the first coffee break on both cards and we're all sitting here acting like the gearbox went kaput when really the driver just forgot to steer.

You ever stand on the Strip at 3 AM when the heat hasn’t let up since June and still believe the desert’s chill is hiding around the corner? That’s Belal right now—ain’t dead, ain’t retired, but damn if the lights don’t feel like they’re flickering a little sooner each time. Two fights, two killers, two months apart, same result: first bell you feel his pulse, third round you’re staring at the same slowdown. Edwards? Five months after beating Usman in a war that had his corner praying for his soul—still walked into that cage with a swagger that reeked of “I just handed a welterweight king his walking papers.” Costa, meanwhile, hadn’t fought in over a year, yet his timing was surgical—first fifteen minutes he stuck that straight left like it was bolted to Belal’s temple. The belt didn’t turn to rust overnight; it got carved up by men who treat a jab like a surgeon treats a scalpel. The room’s still spinning, the volume’s just lower than it used to be.

Belal’s heart? Still right there—no question. I saw him in person at the Manchester meet-and-greet last March, shook his hand for a full twenty seconds while he answered every fan’s question like it was the main event of his week. That man cares more about the game than anyone still standing in that locker room, and that’s not the talk of a fighter whose gearbox has grenaded. I could see the edge still flickering in his eyes when he spoke about technique, about cutting up opponents on the feet rather than trading in the pocket. Yet two steps back, I keep replaying those third rounds in London like a nightmare loop. Edwards didn’t drop him with a magic strike; he slipped inside Belal’s shell because the jab—Belal’s own bread-and-butter—went from a laser to a pinball against Costa’s layered guard. You watch the slow-motion tape and you catch it: every time Belal lifted the right hand, the left glove was already half-way to the target, and Costa just stayed patient, waiting for the overcommit. That’s not prime slipping; that’s a master lock-picker finding a key you forgot you left in the door. The chip stack? Still warm. But the lock’s rusting.

Oh come off it lads, we’re sat here debating whether a fighter who’s just had his own belt handed back to him with two lessons learnt inside twelve weeks is still in his prime like he’s some 2018 McGregor waiting in the wings 🤡 When Belal walked into both those cages in December and March he wasn’t facing some journeymen come-up kids—he was staring down two blokes who run 14-1 on when they taste blood. Edwards had just left Usman jelly-legged at 20-5; Costa was stepping off a fifteen-month layoff with a sniper’s scorecard against everyone not named Paulo Costa. These aren’t footnotes you humour with clichés about heart—they’re the names on your end-of-year highlight reel before the boxing day sales. And in reality? Belal’s jab used to be the North Star for fighters trying to map their game. Two fights in, two men had taken the same GPS route straight to the trash can and Belal’s shell just turned into a revolving door. The laser went dull. The rhythm flatlined. That’s not “heart” getting muffled—that’s an artist forgetting how to hold the brush. We can clutch our chest all we want about “guts,” but when every switch-hit straight left lands on your forehead instead of theirs, the chips don’t just cool down—they burn black.

Mate, you’re all singing Belal’s song like a choir of angels, but open your eyes! 😱 Two losses on the bounce to Edwards and Costa — dudes who’d just came off wars themselves! Edwards was gasping after Usman, Costa was a ghost man coming off 15 months—AND THEY’RE THE ONES WHO TURNED HIS CAGE INTO A CLASSROOM! 🤬 How is that "heart says it all" when every classmate’s notebook’s got red ink all over it?! The gearbox’s still humming, sure, but the engine’s knocking like a diesel truck in a tunnel! 🚛💨 And don’t give me that "they studied his tape" rubbish—everybody’s studied Belal’s tape since he went 12-0! If it was that easy, why aren’t the rest of the welterweights doing it? And the jab—the bread and butter—gone from North Star to shooting star… hit him more than he hit them in those two fights! 🌠💥 No, no, no—prime’s prime, heart’s heart, but you can’t outrun geometry! Two kings walk in, two kings walk out with the keys, and Belal’s still holding the change! 👑🔑

Watching Belal ride the tube from his gym in Walthamstow to the venue in December, I kept thinking about how that very carriage used to shake whenever us fans stuffed the carriage full of voices screaming “he’s next.” Now two trains later, we’re standing on the platform re-reading the same cancelled ticket stub. Both Edwards and Costa didn’t just beat him—they rewrote the rules of engagement while Belal stood there holding a playbook he himself had drawn up. The jab that once dictated tempo now flickers like a bulb with dodgy wiring; every time he lifted the right hand the left glove had already answered the door for the guest who’s been parked in the building since 2018. The heart’s still ticking in the locker room—there’s no debate on that—yet the questions start the second you clock the stopwatch again. Two cages, two chess masters dismantling the same architecture in twelve weeks flat. The gearbox hums, sure, but the driver’s map now has more blank spaces than landmarks and none of us are naive enough to pretend a quick splash of WD-40 fixes thirty-six months of muddy roads.