Paid Members Egg Shen Posted March 4 Paid Members Share Posted March 4 We closing the book on knockout of the year lads? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Carbomb Posted March 4 Paid Members Share Posted March 4 Good god. Hope Sopaj is alright. Fair play to him for stepping up at the last minute, but bloody hell - imagine that being your reward. Good to see Aiemann Zahabi continue his winning ways. Handing Basharat his first loss looks good too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted March 4 Paid Members Share Posted March 4 2 hours ago, Carbomb said: Good god. Hope Sopaj is alright. Fair play to him for stepping up at the last minute, but bloody hell - imagine that being your reward. he did get a 50k bonus to help ease the headache. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Carbomb Posted March 4 Paid Members Share Posted March 4 3 minutes ago, Egg Shen said: he did get a 50k bonus to help ease the headache. Fair enough, but I hope he hasn't sustained the kind of damage that incurs $60K in US hospital bills. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Egg Shen Posted March 4 Paid Members Share Posted March 4 i'm fairly sure the UFC cover that kind of thing, there are some perks to the gig Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted March 4 Author Paid Members Share Posted March 4 (edited) Yeah. This happened. One of those shows where the prelims were better than the main card. Main event was fucking wank. I think we all half expected it but I was trying to be glass half full and hoping the combination of Rozenstruik being a KO hunter and me not having seen much of Gaziev might be the recipe for a surprisingly fun brawl. Thought it had a decent chance of just being a one round shootout ending with a big knockout. But no. Instead they plodded about, Gaziev looked knackered after just one round and it went downhill from there. Rotten stuff. And as if the fight going 4 rounds wasn’t enough torture, even the ending was a complete anti-climax. I hate questioning fighters from the warmth and comfort of my living room but it seemed like Gaziev had mentally checked out by the end of the 4th. He was bloody and wincing at Rozey’s punches, spitting his mouthpiece out etc. Then he went back to the corner and, while I couldn’t understand what he was saying, he was talking a lot to his corner, which is never a good sign. He looked dejected and gassed and then I heard the translator for his cornerman say to him “what do you wanna do?” At that point I knew he wasn’t coming out for the 5th round. Just from the body language you could tell his corner were trying to convince him and he was having none of it. Marc Goddard did the right thing at that point stepping in and calling it off. Although I like to think Goddard was just as sick of this shitty fight as the rest of us and was sparing us. Didn’t think much of Vitor Petrino in the co-main. Really disappointed in this. Not the kind of fight I expected at all. I thought Petrino would ultimately batter Pedro but I thought it’d be one of those fun squashes and Pedro would make a bit of a scrap of it while it lasted. It just never got going though. I kept waiting for it to catch fire and it never did. In the long run, it’ll probably be good experience for Petrino. He got 3 rounds in and he can watch it back and learn from it. No doubt there’s better to come from him but I’ve gotta admit, the shine’s come off a bit for me. I really thought he was a solid prospect, and maybe he still can be, but he really should’ve looked better against a guy like Pedro here. Especially now we know it was a retiring Pedro! Haven’t watched Pedro’s post-fight presser thing yet, only seen his in-cage retirement. It’s a shame to see it end like that but, it’s sad to say but I think he already peaked a long time ago. He probably knows that deep down. Like I said, I haven’t heard his full comments to the media yet but from little bits I’ve read it sounds like it’s partly his heart not being fully in it anymore and in large part a financial decision because he can’t afford to keep at it. Sad state of affairs really. Wasn’t a fan of the Mokaev fight either. Mokaev’s got undeniable potential but every time I watch him I can’t help but think he’s not ready for the top level. He’s getting away with it at the moment but barely. He was 0-2 rounds down to Tim Elliott before pulling out the late finish. He’s had scares against unranked and debuting fighters before that. Now he wins but looks very unconvincing against a guy who’d been inactive for nearly 2 years. I actually thought Perez could’ve quite easily nicked this if he’d just done a bit more in that last round. I know there’s been talk of Mokaev getting the shot at Pantoja on the Brazil PPV in May, and I can see that happening despite this lacklustre performance just because who else is there for Pantoja right now? But man, I think Pantoja absolutely schools him. Mokaev might never be ready for Pantoja but I think his best chance isn’t now. He probably needs a few more fights. But he’s up there in the rankings now, he can’t go backwards. And he seems hell bent on chasing that ‘youngest UFC champ’ accolade. Nothing I’ve seen makes me think he’s got anything for Pantoja though. He has too many bad habits and makes too many mistakes for an operator the level of Pantoja not to capitalise on. Umar Nurmagomedov ended up dominating Almakhan. He could’ve done with a finish, especially as Almakhan was a late substitute, but coming off a long layoff maybe getting 3 rounds in will be more beneficial to him. Wasn’t the most exciting fight but a win’s a win. Almakhan had no answer for the wrestling. Must admit, when Almakhan dropped him in the first minute of the fight, I thought we were in for the upset. But Umar wrestled the bollocks off him. Not even sure how clean a knockdown it was really. Looked like Umar was dropping for a takedown at the same time anyway. Been seeing a lot of ‘Umar’s overrated’ stuff since Saturday. Maybe he is, maybe he isn’t. That’s the problem. We need to see him tested against the higher ranked Bantamweights to properly gauge it. He mentioned Cory Sandhagen in his post-fight interview and we were meant to see that last year. Sandhagen’s not booked either so that’s the fight that makes the most sense to me. Hopefully we get to see it and hopefully it’s 5 rounds. Steve Erceg kicked the main card off with a bang. Nasty KO and Schnell’s head bounced off the canvas… All that time on the shelf for Schnell and he comes back for that? Poor prick. He was game as he always is, but that left hook proper wiped him out. Erceg’s fun to watch. Not typically a big hitter, this was only his second knockout, but I’ve enjoyed all his UFC fights so far. I liked his callout of Brandon Moreno but it feels like a bit of a waste of time because it’s most likely not happening. Looking at the rankings, maybe Manel Kape or Matheus Nicolau are more realistic. I wouldn’t be against the Moreno fight at all though. Get Moreno mixing with some different opponents and give some of these up and comers at least a chance to get the rub. The prelims was where the best stuff happened on this one. Aside from Anders vs Pickett, which I skimmed through, it was a good set of fights. Yeah…Vinicius Oliveira might just have Knockout Of The Year sewn up already. Jesus H Christ! It was one of them knockouts where you go from awe to real concern in a split second. It was a brutal knee, Oliveira had a run up as you can see, it landed flush on the jaw and Sopaj went down like he’d been shot in the head. He fell like there were no bones in his body. I was relieved when I saw he was up and he’s since posted something vowing to come back strong. Glad he’s OK. It was some knockout though. Just on its own, as a highlight or gif or whatever, it’s a stunning KO. But in the context of the fight it was even more dramatic. They were a round apiece going into that last round, Oliveira was winning the third and it looked like he was gonna take a competitive decision. Then he pulls that KO out with less than 20 seconds left in the fight! Incredible. It’s gonna be forgotten because all the focus is on the finish but it was a fantastic fight even before that. Having never seen either before, it was a great introduction to both. Although obviously ended horribly for Sopaj. But even then, he stepped in on very short notice so there’s that. Great fight though. They rightly got FOTN and Oliveira got a POTN bonus as well. I’ll be looking forward to seeing both these guys next fights. Like @Carbomb I was happy to see Aiemann Zahabi get the win as well. I like him and I’ve soured big time on Basharat so I was very satisfied to see Aiemann hand him his first loss. Not sure why Basharat was moaning when the decision was read. Thought it was a pretty clear 29-28 in favour of Zahabi myself. I had Basharat winning the first round and nothing more. Christian Leroy Duncan seems to have settled in and started feeling at home in there now. Didn’t get off to the best of starts in the UFC but his last fight and now this was good stuff from him. Ribeiro’s a power puncher and dangerous but CLD was clearly the better striker here, and I liked that he showed a new wrinkle to his game by taking Ribeiro down and getting the ground and pound stoppage. Good performance. Cormier mentioned the Manchester card in July and that’s a no brainer for Duncan’s next fight, isn’t it? Fuck it, throw him in there with Kopylov. Nice to see Mark Weir there in Duncan’s corner as well. Old school! Ludovit Klein wrecked AJ Cunningham. Just blitzed him in a round. Cunningham was a late replacement, to be fair, but this looked like more than that. Klein just looked a different class in the striking. Cunningham had nothing for him. Beautiful finishing sequence from Klein as well. Lovely combo. Not sure what’s next for Klein. I’d have liked to have seen them just reschedule that Joel Alvarez fight that was supposed to go down on this card but Alvarez is booked against Mateusz Rebecki now. Won’t happen but I wouldn’t mind seeing Klein get the Pimblett fight. If not that, Klein vs Drew Dober wouldn’t offend me. Really liked the Loik Radzhabov vs Abdul-Kareem Al-Selwady curtain jerker as well. I’ve enjoyed all the Radzhabov fights I’ve seen so far and this was no different. Gotta say as well, it’s based on nothing other than the eye test but I think this was the first fight since the USADA era came to an end where I looked at both guys and consciously thought ‘yep, USADA days are over’. Especially Radzhabov. The man had muscles on top of muscles on his fucking back. Radzhabov? More like Roidzhabov! He was really bullying Selwady around for most of the first round, until Selwady caught him a treat with this right at the end of the round… That seemed to give him a real confidence boost and I had him winning the second round, so I had them 1-1 going into the last round. And as the third round got underway I thought Radzhabov was flagging a bit. Selwady had been pushing a hard pace and it looked like Radzhabov was feeling it. But just when I thought Selwady might be taking over and heading towards a decision win… Radzhabov fucking clobbered him. Unfortunate for Selwady in his UFC debut but it was a good fight. Radzhabov just got to him. Yeah, very much a card of two halves for me this. Main event was shite and, to be honest, a lot of the main card was underwhelming. Prelims were good fun though. Whatever, onto 299 we go! Edited March 4 by wandshogun09 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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