Julianna Peña lodges complaint with ManMMA

In a press conference today, Outback Cyclone fighter Julianna Peña announced she would be submitting a complaint to the higher-ups of ManMMA due to actions of the crowd and referee misconduct.

"Between rounds of my most recent fight against Erin Toughill, I was hit in the face with an object thrown from the croud," the fighter explained. "I still don't know what it was, but suddenly I felt a cutting pain and blood started pouring down my face, to the point where I couldn't see anymore. I tried to alert Mario Yamasaki to the situation, but he completely ignored my call and started the second round. I had no choice but to try to continue, despite the obvious cut on my face. As you can see, my first round I held my own and felt confident in my ability to win the bout, but after the thrown object I could not see where Toughill was and left myself open for a punch."

When asked about the possibility of an appeal, Peña shook her head. "Sadly, this situation does not qualify for an appeal. Since the action of the crowd did not directly knock me out of the fight, it's still listed as a knockout and there's nothing I can do."

The next question referred to the ref of the match. "Mario Yamasaki saw what happened," Peña claimed. "He saw me get hit. My trainer happened to see that he was looking right at me at the time the object struck my face. He saw the blood start flowing. He heard me yell out that there was interference. And he did absolutely nothing about it. He pretended it didn't happen and continued the fight. He should've at least paused to let me clean up the blood from a non-fight related injury and let security find the individual that threw that shit at me, but instead he let the fight begin and basically handed it to Erin."

When asked if she suspected foul play on the part of Erin Toughill, Peña shook her head. "No, I don't think Erin had anything to do with it. Erin's a tough fighter, but she's a fair fighter. It wouldn't be like her at all to set up a fan. She'd want to feel like she won based on her own abilities, not the actions of a fan - and I feel bad for her that that is being called into question. It's a horrible situation in general for both of us but we just have to keep our heads up and move forward, since there's nothing that can be done on either end to get this overturned and reset. I just have to accept the most questionable loss of my career and move forward to next bout - but I am going to see if I can get my next fight without a crowd within throwing distance of the ring."

Time will tell if those higher up in ManMMA's organization will respond to this travesty, but as it stands it is not a good look for the league as a whole.