Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

Earlier today, NJKF held the 9th installment of its Kick to the Future series and it was, on paper, one of their best cards to date, featuring two title fights, three NEW JAPAN WARS 2012 finals and two of the promotion's champions in non-title action against Thai opponents.

In the main event, NJKF Super Welterweight champion Kenta defended his title for the first time against NEW JAPAN WARS Super Welterweight winner Takenaka Shirakami via unanimous decision on scores of 50-47 and 49-48(x2). Kenta picks up a much-needed win after 3 losses this year to Yasuhiro Kido, TOMOYUKI and Soichiro Miyakoshi. Going forward, we can probably expect to see Kenta back in Krush, possibly attempting to earn his way back to the title. Another possible option would be claiming the final position in the 67kg tournament as he isn't the biggest 70kg fighter. Shirakami had a 2-fight winning streak coming into this fight, but has that snapped.

In the co-main event, Daichi Yamato defeated KEI by 5th round KO to win the NEW JAPAN WARS Super Featherweight tournament and claim the vacant NJKF Super Featherweight title. Yamato has now won 5 in a row and 11 of his last 12, establishing himself as the top Super Featherweight in NJKF and possibly opening up some chances for himself in RISE or Krush at 60kg, should he want to fight under that ruleset. If not, he could make a run at the WPMF or WBC Japan titles currently held by SHIGERU and Yoshinori Nakasuka, respectively. KEI was just 1-1 on the year, defeating Nobuhiro Iwai at Kick to the Future 3, but losing his most recent fight.

In the NEW JAPAN WARS Welterweight finals, WBC Japan Super Welterweight champ Soichiro Miyakoshi defeated Tae-yeon by majority decision to earn a rematch with current NJKF Welterweight champion Yuya Yamato. Since losing their first fight and his WBC Japan Welterweight title to Yamato, Miyakoshi is 4-1 earning the WBC Japan Super Welterweight title and defending it once, handing Masato Otake his first loss and now earning a rematch with Yamato. Miyakoshi seems to be fighting much better since their first fight while Yamato has since had his world rocked by Yuta Kubo. The fight will be a tossup. Tae-yeon made it to the finals with a win over Baku Saenchaigym, but came up short here.

In the last NEW JAPAN WARS final at Super Lightweight, Kazushige Sugama scored a 1st round KO of Marimo to earn a shot at current champ Seiji Takahashi. This fight was a rematch of a 2011 fight which ended with Marimo scoring a TKO of his own. Sugama picks up his second straight win via KO and has some momentum heading into his title fight with Takahashi, which he will certainly need. 

NJKF Super Lightweight champ Seiji Takahashi and Lightweight champ Keijiro Miyakoshi both took on Thai opposition, with different outcomes. Takahashi was scheduled to fight Naoki, but he pulled out and was replaced by Dejpanom Senchaigym, who Takahashi stopped via cut in the 3rd round. Takahashi improves to 3-1 on the year and has a date with Sugama set for the future. In the other Japan vs Thailand fight, Keijiro Miyakoshi took another hit to his bubble as he dropped a split decision to Mongkoldet Sithubon on scores of 30-29, 29-28 and 29-30. After winning the NJKF and WBC Japan Lightweight titles to end 2011, Miyakoshi fought fellow prospect Hikaru Machida to a draw before scoring the biggest win of his career, a majority decision over Koya Urabe. Now he has lost 2 in a row, losing his WBC Japan title to Yosuke Mizuochi and dropping the split decision here. He'll need some big wins in the future to climb back into the picture at 60-63kg. 

Finally, in a NEW JAPAN WARS Flyweight semifinal, prospect Nemo picked up another big win with a unanimous decision win over former WBC Japan Flyweight champion Naoki Otsuki. Nemo is now 6-0-2 (2 KO) in his young career, but has two big wins at 51kg over Shuichi Wentz and Otsuki. While both of those fighters had been struggling of late at Flyweight and had fallen from the top of the division, they are still two good, experienced fighters and being able to put together back to back wins against them is very impressive at this stage in his career. It's impossible to know who he will fight for the vacant NJKF Flyweight title as these were the only two fighters ranked by NJKF at Flyweight, but matchups with top Flyweights Ryuji Kato, Kiminori Matsuzaki, Hiroyuki Yamano and Sazanami Satsutama are all possible and should do well in determining if Nemo is a fringe contender or the real deal.

Quick results after the break Add a comment

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

Krush held the 6^th installment of their 2012 Krush-EX series, headlined by the promotion’s inaugural 67kg fight as well as a fight between 63kg prospects Hiroto Yamaguchi and Atsushi Ogata.

In the main event, Makihira Keita earned a unanimous decision over RISE product Koetsu on scores of 30-28 and 30-29(x2) to win the first 67kg Krush fight. Keita is now 2-1-1 on the year, most recently losing to Masaaki Noiri. With the win, Keita will likely get placed into 67kg tournament that is set to start in January, however that’s not the best news for him as the tournament already boasts stars Yuta Kubo, Yuji Nashiro, Yuya Yamamoto and Shintaro Matsukura.

In the co-main event, DEEP*KICK 65kg champ and 2012 Youth GP semifinalist Hiroto Yamaguchi scored a 1^st round KO of Atsushi Ogata, scoring 3 knockdowns and forcing a referee stoppage. Yamaguchi improves to 5-2 on the year with the losses coming to SHIGERU and Koya Urabe, while he has managed to pick up wins over fellow prospects Minoru Kimura, Taito and now Ogata. Since scoring an upset KO of Toshiki Taniyama back in July, Ogata has now lost two in a row by KO, most recently losing to Seiji Takahashi in September.

Also on this card was Hiroya’s younger brother Taiga making his pro debut and scoring a 3^rd round KO of Ryota. The fight took place at 55kg, but Taiga is only 16, so expect him to continue to move up in weight as he grows. He will probably settle around 60-63kg in a couple years, so hopefully he has the same offensive talent as his brother and can be another addition to a stacked, young Lightweight division.

Krush returns on December 14^th with the big Team Dragon 10^th anniversary card featuring a 60kg title fight between Hirotaka Urabe and Naoki Ishikawa, Koya Urabe vs Karim Bennoui and Ryuji Kajiwara vs Ikki.

Quick results after the break Add a comment

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

Headed into yesterday, the former It's Showtime 61kg champion Javier Hernandez was coming off two losses in a row. He had lost his title to Masahiro Yamamoto in July and then just three weeks ago, lost to Yuki in Japan. Yesterday at Heroes IV in his hometown of Cordoba, Spain, he faced France's Michael Peynaud, another formidable fighter, at 61kg.

Hernandez was able to get back in the win column, as he won a three round decision over Peynaud in the main event in front of a home crowd of 3500 people. It was a very important win for him, as Peynaud is a strong opponent, and also because it ensures that he doesn't drop out of the LiverKick rankings, which will be updated at Lightweight in about a week.

Also on the card Hernandez's teammates from the RR Team were largely successful on the night. Another up and coming fighter out of the team, Jose Carlos Crespo defeated Belgium's Jean Pierre Habimana by decision, also at 61kg. At 70kg, RR Team's Miguel Repiso scored a TKO win over Nikos Taramas, who came from the Vos Gym in Holland. At 60kg, Jesus Branco Gallardo, also just known as "Pony," scored a TKO win over Vardan Mnatsakanyan.

RR Team has a lot of promising up and coming fighters, and with more events and more planned big fights coming to Cordoba next year, be on the lookout for more of their fighters to be getting some bigger name fights.

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

Steve Moxon returned to the ring today in Melbourne, Australia at Brute Force 21, after his fight last month against Fadi Merza was cancelled.

Moxon faced Giannis Mixalopoulos, a fighter who came all the way from Greece, and also who is fighting at the K-1 MAX Final in Greece next month. Moxon cruised to a unanimous decision victory, dropping Mixalopoulos in the third round.

For Moxon, he has one fight left on the year, taking place at Kings of Kombat 8 in Australia on December 8. From the sounds of it, he'll face Mostafa Abdollahi there.

Moxon signed with GLORY this year and will make his debut for the promotion in 2013.

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

Superkombat Final Elimination went down last Saturday in Romania, with the final eight heavyweights competing in four matches to determine the line-up for the Superkombat Finals on December 22. There were a few questionable decisions, some expected victories, and one fantastic knockout. 

In the surprise of the night, Benjamin Adegbuyi KO'd tournament favorite Sergei Lascenko in the opening round. Adegbuyi and Lascenko exchanged briefly, before the Romanian landed a right hook that sent Lascenko to the canvas. Obviously dazed, Lascenko tried to clear the cobwebs and get back in the fight, but Adegbuyi refused to let him off the hook. Another knockdown followed moments later, and Adegbuyi finished the fight with punches shortly after the second count. With this win Adegbuyi instantly propels himself into the Liverkick top 10 list, and is the favorite to win the Superkombat tournament taking place next month. 

There is some question if Lascenko was 100% for this fight however, considering he originally pulled out of his Final Elimination match-up against Ismael Londt, citing injuries sustained against Hesdy Gerges at K-1 Rising. Lascenko re-entered the tournament when Alexei Ignashov withdrew, prompting many to wonder if he was nursing old wounds.

Pavel Zhuravlev won a decision over an apathetic looking Freddy Kemayo in the second elimnation fight, scoring points with hard body shots and leg kicks. It's a flip of the coin with Kemayo, and you can never tell when he'll come out looking to push the pace, or allow his opponent to walk all over him. Zhuravlev is a big, strong guy, and he was looking to trade early on. As the fight progressed however, he realized Kemayo was having none of it and coasted to an easy win. 

Ismael Londt won a TKO victory over Daniel Sam in a rather weird doctor stoppage. Londt was clearly the superior striker, although just when it looked as though the fight might start to pick up, the doctors halted the match to examine Sam's eye. The eye had closed completely, and the match was called off near the end of the first. 

In the last elimination fight, Sebastian Ciobanu won a questionable decision over Roman Kleibl. The "Son of Dracula" came out swinging in the first round and looked to have Kleibl stunned. Kleibl held on, and fired back with a few leg kicks at the end of the first. The second round went the same way, with Ciobanu going all out at the beginning of the match, and Kleibl either blocking or evading most of the shots. The third round was clearly Roman's, who scored with superior technique. Ciobanu got the nod however, and will move on to the Final 4. 

The four superfights were relatively predictable. Dzevad Poturak vs. Ibrahim Aarab was the most spirited of them all, with Aarab taking a split decision victory. Thomas Hron vs. Dmitry Bezus was a sloppy affair, mingled with a broken ring incident, that finished with an unusual spinning elbow KO, that resulted in a DQ win for Hron. 

The two fights featuring Americans went as predicted, with Ionut Iftimoaie taking a comfortable decision win over James Wilson, and Catalin Morosanu battering Carter Williams over three rounds to earn a decision. 

The semi-finals of the Superkombat tournament will take place on December 22, and the match-ups have already been confirmed by Superkombat president Edward Irimia.  Ismael Londt will take on Sebastion Ciobanu, and Pavel Zhuravlev will face Benjamin Adegbuyi. The card will also feature a slew of big names competing in superfights including Hesdy Gerges, Ben Edwards, Paul Slowinski, Zambit Samedov, and the hopeful return of Bogdan Stoica.  

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

Evening everyone, I'm sitting here ringside at Madison Square Garden, 30 minutes before the fight's supposed to go down. Good stuff is about to happen, as 13 kickboxing fights are about to happen here in the heart of New York City. Muay Thai and a "full K1 rules" event are pretty much guaranteed to have some blistering knockouts and wild action.

Check back here at the bottom of this fanpost for live results and pictures as the action goes down, as I'll be updating constantly.

The main event features two of America's best current Muay Thai combatants, Cyrus Washington and Chike Lindsay. Hardcore MMA fans might also recognize UFC vet Ryan Madigan, who lost to Tamdan McRory back at UFC 96, Jackson vs. Jardine. Check out the highlight video of Cyrus and combination interview/highlight video of Chike:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=MYZ9u8AwtEs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=u5K9WFzLc2w

Results after the break.

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

Krush.24 took place earlier today at Korakuen Hall in Tokyo featuring LiverKick #1 ranked Lightweight Masaaki Noiri taking on #5 Yetkin Ozkul. Also on the card were the 63kg and 70kg Youth GP finals and a 70kg #1 contender match.

In the main event, Masaaki Noiri solidified his #1 ranking with a unanimous decision win over Yetkin Ozkul on scores of 30-28 and 29-27(x2). After an even first 2 rounds, Noiri dropped Ozkul with a flying knee in the final round, securing a victory. Noiri (14-3-0, 5 KO) is now 8-1 in his last 9 and adds another top-tier Lightweight to his win column in Ozkul, who joins the Urabe brothers, Ryuji Kajiwara, Hiroya and Cedric Peynaud. This is a huge win for Noiri as it is his third fight against European competition and the first in which he was not knocked down, although the knockdown against Peynaud was unofficial, which is surprising as Ozkul is known as a power puncher. He is set to face this year's Youth GP winner Koya Urabe, a rematch of the Youth GP finals last year, and another win could easily put Noiri in line for a title shot against the winner of Thomas Adamandopoulos vs Hideaki Yamazaki. Ozkul was coming into this fight off of the momentum of his huge win over Krush 63kg champ Thomas Adamandopoulos in May, but has his momentum a bit derailed here. The loss is no shame, as both fighters excelled at each other's weaknesses and it was Ozkul whose defenses cracked first, leading to the knockdown. A good matchup for him would be a fight with the winner of Karim Bennoui vs Thomas Adamandopoulos at Nuit Des Champions later this month.

In the co-main event, Koya Urabe won the first tournament of his career with a 3rd round KO of Hisaki Higashimoto via flying knee to win the Krush 63kg Youth GP. Urabe dominated Higashimoto with his superior boxing, punishing his body before scoring a flying knee about 30 seconds into the final round that put Higashimoto out for good. Urabe (24-4-0, 4 KO) has struggled in the past to find the perfect balance between aggression and defense, but seemed to have found it quite well here, taking advantage of his opponent's inexperience. The win should be a big motivational boost for Urabe, who made it to the finals of three tournaments last year (Krush, K-1 and Krush Youth), but losing in each one. His next fight is a rematch of last year's Youth GP finals against last year's champion Masaaki Noiri, who added Urabe to his highlight reel with a flying knee KO. Urabe will need to sure up his defense to have a hope at winning. Higashimoto (2-1-0, 1 KO) surprised everyone by making it this far, upsetting Hiroya in the quarterfinals by KO and edging out Daizo Sasaki in the semis. As most would have figured, Higashimoto struggled with Urabe's boxing, as he comes from a kyokushin background and is not used to boxing at Urabe's level. With just 3 fights under his belt, Higashimoto shows a lot of promise and could benefit from fighting someone with the experience, but not the skill, of Urabe next, possibly someone like Kizaemon Saiga, Ikki or Keiji Ozaki.

In the 70kg Youth GP final, Shintaro Matsukura and Taisei Kondo proved to be even through 3 rounds, but Matsukura came on strong in the extension round, scoring big hooks and dropping Kondo 3 times, resulting in a stoppage. With the win Matsukura (7-5-0, 5 KO) becomes the first Krush 70kg Youth GP champion and joins Noiri in winning both the Krush and K-1 Youth tournaments at their respective weights. It's a very positive sign for Matsukura that he came on strong in the extension round as there were previously questions about his stamina, as he fights in an all-or-nothing style, but he seems to have saved that strategy for the later portions of fights he's losing. A good next fight for Matsukura would be a rematch with Yutaro Yamauchi, as the two put on an excellent fight in the Krush 70kg tournament semis. Kondo's only losses have come against Matsukura and at 19, he has a bright future ahead of him. 

Finally, in a fight to determine 70kg champ Yasuhiro Kido's next challenger, Takuro Moriya took an extension round split decision over Asami Zaurus, earning his second win over Asami this year. Moriya ended 2011 with a pair of losses to Su Hwan Lee and Yu Hirono, but is now 4-0 in 2012 with a pair of wins over Asami. Asami was placed into this bout after an upset of Yuya Yamamoto at Krush.20, but is an average fighter outside of that win. Moriya faces Kido at some time in the future, although with Kido's upcoming participation in K-1, it's hard to know when Kido will be ready for a fight in Krush with the possibility of injuries.

Krush returns later this month on the 23rd with Krush-EX 2012 vol.6 featuring the promotion's first 67kg fight between Makihira Keita and RISE regular Kotetsu, as well as a 63kg fight between 2012 Youth GP semifinalist Hiroto Yamaguchi and Atsushi Ogata. 

Quick results after the break

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

The Superkombat Final Elimination show kicks off today, and Liverkick will be there to provide live updates throughout the event. 

The card will feature four final elimination matches and five superfights. The superfights consist of Sergei Lascenko taking on Benjamin Adegbuyi, Daniel Sam facing Ismael Londt, Pavel Zhuravlev fighting Freddy Kemayo,and Roman Kleibl squaring off against Sebastian Ciobanu. 

Three of the superfights will feature Americans HW's: James Wilson vs. Ionut Iftimoae, Carter Williams vs. Catalin Morosanu, and Radu Spinghel vs. Petr Vondracek. 

In addition, the two other super fights will see Dzevad Poturak fighting Ibrahim Aarab and Dmitri Bezus fighting Tomas Hron.

The event kicks off at 21:00 CET in Europe, and begins in North America  at 3 PM ET/12 PM PT. It will be airing live on Eurosport. Follow me @SandersonSensei on twitter for live updates. Click here for the full card.

--
Superfight: Ibrahim Aarab def. Dzevad Poturak by decision

Super Fight: Tomas Hron def. Dimitry Bezus by DQ (Illegal Spinning Elbow)

Final Elimination 1: Pavel Zhuravlev def. Freddy Kemayo by decision

Final Elimination 2: Sebastian Ciobanu def. Roman Kleibl by decision

Final Elimination 3: Ismael Londt def. Daniel Sam by TKO in Round 1 (Doctor Stoppage)

Final Elimination 4: Benjamin Adegbuyi def. Sergei Lascenko by KO in Round 1

Superfight: Ionuţ Iftimoaie def. James Wilson by decision

Superfight: Catalin Morosanu def. Carter Williams by decision

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

Today in Moscow, Russia, W5 held another event, their eighth of the year, headlined by quickly rising, now 70kg fighter Roman Mailov of Ukraine, against Thailand's Armin Pumphanmuang, who has been featured on Thai Fight this year.

Despite the kickboxing ruleset favoring Mailov, who himself comes from a Muay Thai background, Armin was still probably the biggest test of his career to date. It seems that he was at least a tough opponent for Mailov, as the fight went to an extra round. In the extra round, Mailov stopped Armin with a knee to the body and continued his run at 70kg.

This win makes it 14 in a row for Mailov, whose last loss came in October of 2010 all the way back when he was fighting at 63.5kg. Mailov made his move to 70kg this year where he now has eight wins. He's still only 20 years old and one can assume that he's only going to get better. One thing that I think is past an assumption is that his competition is also going to get better. He's faced more international opponents this year like William Diender, Leo Zulic, Vasilis Kakarikos and not to mention Armin Pumphanmuang.

Also on the event was Mailov's teammate, 18 year old prodigy Alim Nabiev who took a decision over Vladimir Shulyak at 70kg. Nabiev has won 6 fights in Russia this year, including against the likes of Alka Matewa and Denis Larchenko. Nabiev only turned 18 last month and for him to already be at this level at his current age is quite amazing for a European fighter.

Tuesday, 18 June 2013 19:41

The It's Showtime 95kg champion Danyo Ilunga still manages to stay very busy when he's not fighting on the big shows like Glory or It's Showtime. Yesterday was more of the same, when he returned to the ring in Hamburg, Germany.

Ilunga faced the long time, aged veteran Florian Ogunade. Needless to say, Ilunga made easy work of him and won by TKO. This is Ilunga's fifth win of the year in Germany alone, with him having a total of seven wins in 2012.

His competition is by no means great when he fights in Germany, but it gives him the chance to stay active and progress. Ilunga seems like a fighter that a lot of people have been waiting on to really make some big improvements and so far when he has faced a higher level of competition this year, he's gotten hit a lot and had a tough time, though he still won.

Video of the fight should be up soon, via FightStarTV, who also provided the photo seen above.