THERE ISN’T EVEN time for the dust to settle on Jon Jones’ awesome performance last week as the UFC have thrust another title fight at us as Dominick Cruz takes on Demetrious Johnson for the Bantamweight championship belt.
The Verizon Centre in Washington hosts UFC Live 6 this weekend as Pat Barry takes on Stefan Struve, Anthony Johnson faces off against Charlie Brenneman and Matt Wiman looks to get the better of Mac Danzig.
UFC steam-train rolls on.
Despite being sandwiched between two high quality shows, this weekend’s event still has the enough on the card to stand out.
While most fans will have one eye on next weekend’s title double header, Dominck Cruz will be more than happy to quietly edge towards retaining his title once more.
The man standing in his way is the diminutive Johnson, dubbed “Mighty Mouse”, who is coming off the back of four straight wins. He will have his work cut out trying to second guess the always active and very technical Cruz, but if he can take the fight to him and keep up the pace for five rounds he has a chance.
Both fighters have six decision victories between them in each of their last three fights so form suggests that it should be a close one and as Cruz has the most experience in the championship rounds I’m plumping for him to win via decision.
Little v Large
What do you get when you pit a 5’ 11” kick-boxer against a 6’ 11” BJJ specialist? We will find out when Pat Barry takes on Stefan Struve in an enthralling heavyweight bout on Saturday.
The two have bucked the trend of hate-filled trash talking in the lead up to their fight with the two friends partaking in genuinely funny back and forth twitter and youtube exchanges.
But when it comes to the serious action inside the Octagon friendship will be put aside and stylistically it has all the hallmarks of being a great fight.
Barry could find success with his lethal leg kicks as he has a lot to aim for. If he can use his leg kicks to set up his powerful striking he could take apart the “Skyscraper” in the later rounds of the fight.
Anthony Johnson and Charlie Brenneman face off against each other as both look to climb up a step in the very competitive welterweight division.
Johnson is a big welterweight and usually relies on this to dominate fights through his strength and wrestling. Brenneman will almost inevitably look for the takedown but the strong all-rounder does have other options in his arsenal if he is unsuccessful.
A win for either would push them closer to the top of the pile in the division so there is a lot riding on this fight. In close fights like this I tend to favour the man with better wrestling so Johnson gets my vote here.
The final fight on the main card is a re-match between Matt Wiman and Mac Danzig. Their fight last June was controversially stopped early by a referee decision so Danzig has the chance to avenge that result.
Wiman has arguably the better stand-up and while Danzig will look to his jiu-jitsu a expect Wiman to come out with a victory once again.
UFC Live 6 airs for free on Setanta Sports 1 this weekend.
