Jaffar Vs Ebrahimi I

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As Nesrine Jaffar walked to the cage with her team, she could almost hear the murmurs from the crowd. She was used to it. Nesrine's outfit was almost always the first thing noticed about her. Her pink boxing outfit, usually stained with her opponent's blood, wouldn't suit her for MMA debut. She opted instead for a new look, custom-made by her maternal aunt: a pink top that accommodated her Islamic beliefs as it covered her skin (while being tight enough as to not to give her opponents an advantage) and black shorts with white compression pants underneath. She already made her mark in the boxing world, silencing her critics but somehow, to her disappointment, the same condescending questions followed her into the MMA world.

At the press conference, she expected a plethora of questions regarding her transition to MMA from boxing. She realized after the first question what she had to deal with.

"Won't you get hot in that in your fight?" asked the first reporter, pointing to her hijab.

Nesrine sighed. There it is again. "I'm used to it and the material that I'll wear in the fight is breathable so it doesn't really bother me.

Another reporter stuck out his head and stood up. "Since MMA involves much more grappling compared to boxing, aren't you afraid that there might be an accident with your hee-jab falling off? A wardrobe malfunction?"

The press audience laughed but Nesrine kept a straight face. She didn't find it funny. She had hoped the question could have been about her balanced training regiment and how her ground game had been making huge strides but everything always came back to her religious beliefs. "I have a custom-made hijab by my aunt that fits snugly on my head." Nesrine looked at the crowd and added, "the other plus side is at least I don't have to spend ten hours braiding my hair before my fights." The audience chuckled at that.

A third reporter now stood up as a microphone was passed to him. "What would you say to people if they ask ,'Why does MMA have to accommodate your beliefs?' They would cite that your opponent, Cass, an American Muslim girl and fellow Iranian, as a counter example of someone who at least assimilated into culture and fits to MMA's rules. Does it make your struggle harder when your opponent, who shares the same religious beliefs as you, dresses the way female MMA fighters are expected to."

Nesrine was taken aback as to how many outrageous questions the reporter had fired off. Nobody seemed to be bothered by his patronizing questions. "Wow, I don't know where to begin with that one. First, MMA is a universal sport. Fighting is the one sport that every man, woman and child can understand. Women in many parts of the world cannot afford or have the resources to train in many sports. Fighting is something we can all at least learn the basics of. Why create barriers when there are SO many women, from all walks of life, from all over the world, wanting to fight? We don't give a damn what we are expected to wear."

The press audience clapped at Nesrine's response. She smiled and continued,. "As for Cass, yes she's Muslim too and we share Iranian blood but she can dress however she wants, I don't really care. Why should I? The only thing I care about is making sure she doesn't have a successful debut against me. My worry isn't her clothing, I'm more concerned about the fact that I'm facing a seasoned Olympian who excels at kicking and I need to bring my A-game in this fight. We're both Persian and you can bet we're both going to be warriors in that cage. She's expecting me to box but I have some surprises," she said, winking to the crowd.

Nesrine's coach helped slide the mouthpiece in and watched his half-Iraqi, half-Iranian fighter enter the cage. She donned black fingerless gloves, which she had to get used to after using lucky red boxing gloves for so long. She galloped around the perimeter of the fighting area, waiting for her opponent to enter.

Cass' music hit and she came out with a team and entered the cage as Nesrine watched on. Nesrine had casually watched some training videos of Cass and watched all of her Olympic matches, not that it helped, but it at least allowed her to familiarize herself with her opponent. But Cass' white sports bra and white/green shorts really showed off her physique. "Wow she looks really strong, this isn't going to be easy," Nesrine thought to herself. Nesrine had a great physique as well but it was covered for the most part because of her religious fighting attire.

The referee brought them both to the center of the cage. Nesrine barely listened to the instructions... her focus was now all on Cass.

The bell rang and Nesrine immediately came forward speedily to close the distance. She did NOT want to give her taekwondo expert opponent the distance required to nail one of those deadly face kicks. Closing the distance and overwhelming Cass with hard punches and elbows was the key to Nesrine's fight plan.

Cass immediately fired off a roundhouse kick, narrowly missing Nesrine's head. The veil-clad fighter barrelled forward, throwing heaving bombs at her opponent. The first hit surprised Cass' defense. Nesrine couldn't help but smile as she saw an opening and fired a left hook towards Cass' cheek, hearing the satisfying crunch of contact.

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A POV switch from Vanqvisher's story - fav.me/db20jhh

Cass Ebrahimi by

Nesrine Jaffar by

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