Bellator light heavyweight champion Vadim Nemkov defeated Yoel Romero and, having defended the title for the fourth time, he came close to the title of the best fighter in the league, regardless of weight categories (Р4Р). About the next success of the Russian and other significant fights of the 297th tournament of the American promotion — in the material Sport.
Fedor's student goes to a new levelNow Nemkov is one of the main (if not the main) asset of Scott Cocker's league. Everything was decided by the previous match. How many doubts fans and journalists had in Vadim after the first confrontation with Corey Anderson, which was declared invalid due to a headbutt, and in November 2022 they all evaporated. The Russian confidently passed the American in the second meeting and, retaining the belt, took a million dollars for winning the Grand Prix.
Nemkov then found himself at a crossroads:
Vadim chose the first option. Now he has a multi-year contract — the point to raise the topic of a potential change of «circle» to the octagon has disappeared for the next few years.
But the spirit of the UFC still hovered around Chicago's Wintrust Arena today. The domestic athlete fought with the loudest name on his fighting path. Former world champion and silver medalist of the 2000 Olympics in freestyle wrestling, ex-contender for the UFC title and brutal knockout puncher in the world's main MMA promotion. All this is about the hero of Russian social media memes, MMA veteran Yoel Romero. The same 46-year-old Cuban who came to the «title» on a series of two victories and with colossal experience of competing with such tops as Israel Adesanya and Robert Whittaker, Luke Rockhold and Chris Weidman.
Initially, the fight was supposed to take place in February in Los Angeles, but Nemkov was forced to withdraw due to health problems.
Age is just a number How good is a Cuban in his fifties! It doesn't matter that he thoughtlessly missed most of the fight from Nemkov. It doesn't matter that there were about five exacerbations from Romero in 25 minutes … The man, a real mountain of muscle, not only lasted the whole distance, but also finished the fight in a dominant position on the champion.
From Vadim, who is younger than the applicant by as much as 16 years, they were waiting for the finish line. But from his absence, the fight did not become less spectacular: for five rounds, the Russian beat the Soldier of God, and at times he himself ran into counterattacks. Somewhere, UFC champion Israel Adesanya smirked in annoyance, whose careful sleeping pill fight against Romero was one of the biggest disappointments in the promotion's history.
«
“Proud to have shared a cage with a legend like Romero today. It was a tough fight. A very strong opponent, it was hard to knock him out. I saw that he was not acting very confident, so I just continued to do my job. He tried to strike from a distance, but he has a very strong head. (MMA Fighting)
Vadim NemkovRussian MMA fighter
From the outcome of the battle, both were victorious. Old man Romero has not lost ahead of schedule since 2011 and receives a huge portion of respect — you can think about retirement. And Nemkov, having taken four rounds out of five (49-46 on the cards of all judges), replenished his resume with a stunning felling.
It's time to rise to the heavyweights behind the second belt.
The gold hunter has fallen prey to veteran Patricio «Pitbull» Freire, who has conquered the featherweight/lightweight divisions and is now making his way into the bantamweight division. For gold, of course. The belt in this weight was owned by Sergio Pettis, brother of former UFC champion Anthony Pettis, and the youngest of the Brazilian fighting family stopped.
The first number, regardless of the division (Р4Р), approached the Bellator 297 co-main battle after a heavy weight race, and Pettis after a year and a half of inactivity. The last factor did not affect at all, because the champion was more than active in the cage, but Patricio got hooked after the debut of the fight. At the end of the second round, Freire almost flew into a knockout: a hi-kick flew just above the temple, but the Brazilian survived until the break … And then he «lived» until the end of the fight, because Sergio Pitbull was unable to oppose something to the perfectly moving and hitting Sergio Pitbull .
Unfortunately for the Brazilian fans, on Saturday night we did not see a successful assault on the third weight division. Who knows, perhaps this week Nemkov will move Patricio from the first place in the updated P4P rating?
Anderson bounced back from Nemkov…and defeated another Belgorod-born ex-rival, Phil Davis. The duel of the first and second light heavyweights turned out to be viscous, the Americans fought a lot and did not really want to put out the lights. As a result, Corey took the fight by split decision, but, let's face it, he didn't deserve to meet our champion again in the next fight.
But the Russian, who beat the entire top three in the division, had no other legitimate contenders left. So, if Vadim's rematch with Ryan Bader is not expected in the «heavyweights», the announcement of Nemkov VS Anderson should not be surprised. br>
The Russians fried prelimsTwo fights, two wins. Undefeated Ramazan Kuramagomedov (now on a 12-0 record) made a successful debut in the promotion, knocking out American Jalil Willis in the first round. The video is attached.
Later at the tournament, his compatriot Gadzhi Rabadanov defeated Peter Beist from the Netherlands: the fight lasted all 15 minutes and ended with the success of the Dagestani by unanimous decision of the judges.