Cage Warriors 68: Wallhead vs. Roberts Preview

Saturday 3rd May
Echo Area, Liverpool

Simply put, this is most likely going to be the best & biggest single UKMMA card of the year (discounting CWFC’s teased Super Saturday dual card…)

That’s not hyperbole, just look at the fights!

The headliner sees CWFC veteran ‘Judo’ Jim Wallhead (25-8) return after a spell alternating between Bellator and BAMMA and is indisputably one of England’s top welterweights not contracted to the UFC, while across the cage we have in-form hometown boy Danny ‘Hot Chocolate’ Roberts (10-1) who is riding a four fight win streak.

Both men are in clear contention for the Welterweight belt now held by Nicolas Dalby and should provide a heated and competitive climax to the evening’s fights.

Experience is clearly on Wallhead’s side, but Roberts has the greater momentum and such advantage as comes from fighting with the crowd in your corner.

With both fighters being finishers (72% for Wallhead, 80% for Roberts) capable of ending a fight on the feet and each in possession of some excellent grappling skills this is sure to be a great fight to watch.

Backing up that main event we have exciting and accomplished English fighters Ronnie Mann (23-6-1) and Matt Inman (13-5) facing international opposition in Marcelo Costa (8-2-1) and Mauro Chimento Jr (15-10) respectively.

Not enough? OK, how about a middleweight contest between ex-UFC fighter Che Mills (15-7) and the popular Leeroy Barnes (12-13, 1NC) both looking to break losing streaks?

The undercard also features Dinky Ninja’s John Cullen (17-8-2) and Dean Reilly*(6-5) so we’ve got more than a little local interest in the event as well.

*Sadly Dean’s match was cancelled due to his opponent pulling out due to injury. 😦

It’s a cracking card and we can’t wait for Saturday.

Viewing Details:

LIVE STREAMING

MMAjunkie.com | USA and Canada only
http://www.IrishMMA.tv | Ireland only
Viaplay | Scandinavia only
CageWarriors.tv | Rest of the world

LIVE TV

Premier Sports | United Kingdom
Setanta Sports 1 | Ireland
TV 10 | Sweden
Fight Now TV | USA
The Fight Network | Canada, Portugal, Belgium, Turkey, Middle East
Fight Klub | Poland
Setanta Action | Africa
ESPN | Caribbean, Latin America, Pacific Rim

MAIN CARD | 9pm BST local time (4pm ET, 1pm PT)

Danny Roberts vs. Jimmy Wallhead
Marcelo Costa vs. Ronnie Mann
Mauro Chimento vs. Matt Inman
Steve Dinsdale vs. Matt Hallam
Leeroy Barnes vs. Che Mills
John Cullen vs. Dean Garnett

FACEBOOK PRELIMS | 7.50pm BST local time (2.50pm ET/11.50am PT)

Conrad Hayes vs. Paddy Pimblett
Dez Parker vs. Charlie Watts
Ant Phillips vs. Adam Ventre

UNAIRED PRELIM | 7.30pm BST local time

Ellis Hampson vs. Azi Thomas

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly: #CWFCJordan Edition

Cage Warriors Fight Night 10: Azaitar vs. Marshman

March 28, 2014
King Hussein Youth City Boxing Arena
Amman, Jordan

The Good

I’ve always liked the way Cage Warriors cards keep a good pace up, with minimal gaps between matches but with four first round finishes on the main card, it was all done in less than one hour and forty minutes – less time than it takes a standard football match to play out.

Thats loads of exciting finishes and having a big chunk of evening left to play with. What’s not to love?

All those finishes made it an explosive night as well, with the concussive victories of Carl Booth and Abu Azaitar sure to live long in the memory, while the slick subs of Marcin Lasota, Dave Hill and Marat Pekov a joy for any fans of the gentle art.

Competitive, aggressive action with top notch production and excellent commentary. As usual. Keep up the good work folks, you’re on a hell of a run.

The Bad

From a purely nationally biased point of view, the losses for John Cullen and Allan Love soured the evening a bit for us (and most Scottish MMA fans, I’d imagine) but both acquitted themselves well against high level opposition, with Love surely only needing another round to change the result over Paraisy.

The Ugly

It’s never nice to see a fighter concede a contest and after surviving some brutal submission attempts from Malik Merad, Mohamed Ali verbally submitted seconds into the third round. This is ‘ugly’ because it invariably indicates an injury and we hope ‘Felix’ is better soon.

Similarly, we hope Jack Marshman and Jarrah Al-Silawi recover quickly from their concussive knockouts.

Bonuses (if we had the chequebook)

Fight of the Night

Dave Hill vs. Miguel Haro was a fast paced technical fight which lit me up. With some stunning grappling on display and a real back and forth battle, I couldn’t give the award to anyone else.

Performance of the Night 1

Yazan Janeb dominated his fight with Hicham Laghzali and was a constant threat with submissions through the first two rounds. As Laghzali proved to have exceptional heart and a tendency to survive and escape subs, Janeb changed it up in the third to achieve a dominant position and earn the TKO win via ground & pound.

Tremendous skills and maturity for a pro debut.

Performance of the Night 2

Marcin Lasota may be undefeated and a submission specialist but the way he disposed of the excellent Paul Marin was impressive beyond words.

Finish of the Night

Carl Booth’s knockout of Jarrah Al-Silawi was so sudden, so brutal that I still have a sore jaw more than a day after watching the fight. In the words of Ron Simmons… DAMN!

Cage Warriors return on April 12th where James Brum will challenge Brett Johns for the Bantamweight belt in Swansea, Wales.

Main Card

Abu Azaitar def. Jack Marshman via TKO (punches) – Round 1, 0:34
Marat Pekov def. John Cullen via submission (armbar) – Round 1, 3:45
Malik Merad def. Mohamed Ali via submission (eye injury) – Round 3, 0:09
Norman Paraisy def. Allan Love via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27) – Round 3, 5:00
Marcin Lasota def. Paul Marin via submission (armbar) – Round 1, 3:02
Carl Booth def. Jarrah Al-Silawi via knockout (punch) – Round 1, 0:31

Preliminary Card
Dave Hill def. Miguel Haro via submission (guillotine choke) – Round 2, 2:11
Yazan Janeb def. Hicham Laghzali via TKO (strikes) – Round 3, 2:57

Cage Warriors Fight Night 10: Azaitar vs. Marshman Preview

March 28, 2014
King Hussein Youth City Boxing Arena
Amman, Jordan

A week removed from their card-of-the-year-so-far in Copenhagen, Denmark, the Cage Warriors roadshow pops up in Jordan for their tenth ‘fight night’ card in the Middle East.

Stacked with interesting and championship-relevant bouts despite a relative lack of ‘big’ names, this card promises plenty of action and perhaps a few opportunities for some real stars and belt contenders to emerge.

Headlining the card, recent signing Jack Marshman (14-4) faces Germany’s Abu Azaitar (8-2) with the winner likely to be right in the mix for the currently vacant Middleweight belt last held by World Series of Fighting’s Jesse Taylor.

A former British army boxing champion, Marshman has earned ten of his fourteen victories by knockout, although he has also shown impressive grappling and submission skills.

Azaitar is also a finisher with six of his eight wins coming inside the distance and most of them coming through strikes as well.

Basically, this is unlikely to be a lengthy or sedate affair and these two are likely to throw leather until one of them hits the canvas.

Both men come in on win streaks and interestingly already have matches booked in May, so must both be confident of a quick knockout win. It will definitely be interesting to find out.

The pick of the rest of the fights features Scotland’s Allan Love (11-4) – who was nice enough to give us an interview earlier in the week – against France’s Norman Paraisy (13-3-2) in another bout which may produce a contender for the 185lb belt.

Love is riding a four fight streak of stoppage victories while Paraisy is on a four fight unbeaten streak characterised by dogged performances against Chris Fields (set to appear on the next season of The Ultimate Fighter) and Leeroy Barnes, getting a draw and a win respectively despite being on the back foot against more aggressive fighters.

Paraisy’s losses all came on trips to fight for Bellator in the US, while Love’s four defeats are bunched into a five fight run where he fought some of Europe’s best on their own patch.

Will the stoppage seeking Scotsman or the canny Frenchman come out on top on neutral ground?

Also on the card, the Most Exciting Fighter In Scotland, John Cullen (17-7-2) faces Marat Pekov (10-5) who impressed in his recent CWFC losses to James Brum and Ronnie Mann alongside Marcin Lasota (7-0) and Paul Marin (7-3) who will both have an eye on Neil Seery’s vacated Flyweight crown.

We’ve also got former Featherweight title contender Dave Hill (11-3) against late replacement Miguel Haro (7-4), an appearance by the ever entertaining local favourite Mohamed Ali and a bundle of fighters who’s names I don’t recognise, which just causes me to wonder what gems Ian Dean has unearthed this time!

Cage Warriors never disappoint and their Fight Night cards have often been far more than the apparent sum of their parts and considering the already awesome parts, you should definitely catch the show live on FRIDAY, starting at 5:10pm on Facebook and Premier Sports at 6pm for the main card.

Full Card

Abu Azaitar vs. Jack Marshman
John Cullen vs. Marat Pekov
Mohamed Ali vs. Malik Merad
Allan Love vs. Norman Paraisy
Marcin Lasota vs. Paul Marin
Miguel Haro vs. Dave Hill
Jarrah Al-Silawi vs. Carl Booth
Elodie Puget vs. Vanessa Rico
Hicham Laghzali vs. Yazan Janeb