UFC fans accused welterweight Darrius Flowers of "FAKING" a low blow in his welterweight clash with Jake Matthews.
The Dana White's Contenders Series alum locked horns with the Aussie on the prelim portion of UFC 291 in Salt Lake City on Saturday night.
Flowers found himself rocked in the first round but managed to weather the ensuing storm and make it to the second round.
But he drew the ire of MMA fans moments after the restart when he appeared to feign injury after being caught flush with a teep.
The balls of Matthews' left foot landed flush in the midsection of the UFC newboy – who collapsed to the canvas in agony.
Replays clearly showed the strike was a legal one, although the referee didn't see them and the fight eventually resumed after a prolonged break in the action.
That prompted outrage from fans, one of whom tweeted: "Flowers is faking."
Another said: "Flowers milking the hell out of this. Dude got kicked in the stomach.
"Get your ass up and stop pretending you got kicked low."
And another said: "Get up Flowers you p***y!!!! Matthews win by TKO!!! His gut was weak whole fight!!!"
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5One remarked: "Flowers with the fake nut touch.
Another chimed in: "Flowers is such a p***y, first faking to be stumbled and not this free timeout. Get up and fight!"
UFC commentator Joe Rogan said: "This is clearly a legal blow from our perspective."
Matthews didn't let the incident distract him and he eventually got the finish via second-round submission to a rear-naked choke.
He said of the incident in his post-fight interview: "If the referee says it was too low, then it was too low.
"It did hit the belt of the shorts, so that's on me.
"All the other teeps before that were on point so I should've been consistent."
He then heaped praise of Flowers for allowing him to fight after original opponent Miguel Baeza was forced to withdraw from their showdown.
He said: "Our goal was to weather that early storm and wait for him to tire out and then finish him as we did.
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"But it's not about me, it's guys like Darrius that [make us] able to fight and to put food on the table for our kids.
"I had a pull-out and he stepped up and took the fight on short notice. So thank you, Darrius."
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