The judges did most of the work for this week’s UFC Fight Night as Ciryl “Bon Gamin” Gane (8-0) extended his unbeaten run with a unanimous decision win over Jairzinho “Bigi Boy” Rozenstruik (11-2) on Saturday, February 27 (Sunday, February 28, Philippine time) at UFC Apex in Las Vegas, Nevada.
In another heavyweight headliner, Gane – the No.7 heavyweight contender – slowly and wisely dictated the pace of the fight and did not let the No.4 ranked Rozenstruik find the counter strike that he was looking for in 25 minutes.
Gane used his range well all throughout the fight and mixed it up with a couple of takedowns in the 2nd round, where he also looked to finish the bout with a rear-naked choke. But Rozenstruik was quick to defend the submission attempt.
The 30-year-old undefeated French fighter continued to fight out of Rozenstruik’s attack zone until the final second of the bout and picked up his fifth win under the UFC brand.
“This guy is really dangerous. He is really tough, he has big knockout power, so we have to manage the fight with this guy, manage the distance and be focused, be careful,” Gane said.
“We made pressure against the cage, we did maybe two, three takedowns, maybe more, I tried to finish the fight, I tried, but yes it was a good fight. I am who I am, I’m a fast learner. I don’t know, maybe it’s because I take everything with a smile,” he added.
Rozenstruik, on the other hand, lost his second bout in his last 3 fights. He won his fight against Junior dos Santos last August but was finished in the 1st round by title contender Francis Ngannou in May 2020.
For the co-main event, No. 11 ranked light heavyweight fighter Magomed Ankalaev (15-1) extended his winning streak by picking up a decision win against the No.8 ranked Nikita “The Miner” Krylov (27-8).
After a slow 1st round, Ankalaev found his rhythm in the following rounds as he started landing his right hand and outwrestled the Ukrainian fighter Krylov to take his sixth straight victory.
“I was planning to fight standing up but once he started wrestling with me, I had to change my tactics and I also wrestled,” Ankalaev said.
“I hope that many people were watching this fight and I’m hoping that they were watching because I was fighting No. 8 in my division and now I’m ready for my next opponent and I’m hoping that UFC would consider giving me a main event,” he added.
While Ankalaev continues winning, Krylov found himself back to the losing column as he dropped 3 of his last 5 fights.
In the clash of bantamweight contenders, No.8 ranked Pedro “The Young Punisher” Munhoz (19-5, 1NC) got his revenge in a rematch against the No.9 ranked Jimmie “El Terror” Rivera (23-5) as he bagged a convincing unanimous decision win.
Rivera got the upper hand in the opening round and landed a left hook that made Munhoz wobble. But the Brazilian fighter shrugged off the heavy hit and used his calf kicks to drop Rivera and regain control inside the octagon.
The heavy exchanges continued in the following rounds as Munhoz easily absorbed all the solid hits from his foe while attacking the compromised leg of Rivera that eventually gave him the advantage in the scorecards.
“Nothing surprising about it. I already knew the type of fight that we were getting in,” Munhoz said. “That’s the reason I was getting anxious a little bit the last couple of days because I knew we were going to exchange and trying to take each other’s head off, so it feels really good.”
“It feels great, I’ve been fighting the best fighters in the world, even my loses were super close against top contenders, but it definitely feels really good to bring the victory back home,” he added.
With his victory, Munhoz also snapped his two-fight losing streak and even out his record against Rivera. Back in 2015, Munhoz lost in their first match-up via split decision. – Rappler.com
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