As the paper notes, when truly fighting, big cats tend to prefer attacking the head and neck of human targets. But the primary bite marks are on the man's pelvis:

> Deaths caused by lions and tigers tend to result from trauma to the neck area, involving the crushing of soft tissue structures and fracturing of the vertebrae, causing suffocation. Both species use their weight to push down the victim, often also leaving extensive damage to the shoulders, arms and chest. Species such as leopards and jaguars focus on the head by puncturing or crushing the skull. [...] The bite marks on 6DT19 are located on the pelvis rather than neck and upper body. Lions and tigers have also been seen to drag their prey away, often by the legs, but lions have also been recorded as causing significant damage to the pelvis of their prey. [...]

> It is proposed, based on the evidence from the archaeological, medical and forensic evidence, that the bite marks on 6DT19 derive from a large felid, such as a lion. The shape is entirely consistent with documented cases of large cat bite marks (such as those presented in [35,46]). The location solely on the pelvis suggests that they were not part of an attack per se, but rather the result of scavenging at around the time of death. The decapitation of this individual was likely either to put him out of his misery at the point of death, or for the sake of conforming to customary practice.

So it was more likely dragging him away (before his dead or nearly-dead body was removed and beheaded), something I don't think it would bother with if it had been seriously wounded. Also, this was likely an execution, so I doubt the man would have had much in the way of weaponry to fight back.