MMA

The champion Magard, Vémola didn’t let the surprise happen! Liberec saw 9 terminations and big surprises. How did OKTAGON 41 look like?

OKTAGON 41 offered an incredible spectacle, several endings, some big surprises and unexpected falls. In addition, we saw the successful return of Karlos Vemola and,Jonas Magard confirmed that he is the rightful champion deservedly. How did the whole tournament in Liberec look like?

Published

1 year ago

15. 4. 2023

Pavel Langr

Prelims

Two surprises and 19-year-old sensation Nafuka

Liberec saw the return of Melvin Mané at the start of the tournament. Still only 24 years old, the fighter has experience mainly in stand-up fights, but he has already had one MMA fight in the past when he fell short to Robin Foshum in November 2020. But he wanted to return to MMA and now he has.

He wanted amateur fights, but his opponents turned him down, so he went to the Octagon to fight the pros. Now he was tested by Polish fighter Szymon Broncel, but he could only regret going for it. For Mané had the upper hand from the start of the fight, dishing out hard shots and at most the Pole tried to tie up in the clinch.

The Czech fighter also tested the ground, delivering one takedown. He found the recipe for his opponent, especially in the form of hard elbows and knees, which he dealt out in spades. He was able to break his opponent down in the second round and won by TKO.

The second fight offered a great grappling spectacle. Peter Gabal went into the talent match as the favorite, however, he was up against the great German talent Hafeni Nafuka. The 19-year-old, who is nicknamed as the Namibian nightmare, had a clear plan from the start.

He tried to take the 24-year-old Czech on the ground from the start and although Gabal put up some resistance and made a couple of moves from the bottom position to the top one, he otherwise had to defend most of the time.

Nafuka kept trying to set up various submissions, twice attempting a kimura, but eventually managed a great guillotine in the second round and Gabal couldn’t get out of it and had to tap out.

German fighter and German Oktagon Challenge participant Jaime Cordero provided the big surprise in the third fight of the night. The latter made his first appearance in the middleweight division against the stylishly unpleasant Ondrej Rashkov, who wanted to torment him with his wrestling.

But Cordero wouldn’t let him. He refused the initial attempts to move the fight to the ground and showed in his stance that he had something to offer and give. The German kicked Rask’s legs well, but he also landed punches to the head. He finished Rask off in the first round when he accurately hit him on the ground, sent him to the ground and finished what he started there.

A controversial draw and two clean KOs!

Robin Foshum made his first appearance in an Oktagon fight in over two years. The Czech fighter had to wait so long for the fight due to health problems, mainly waved off by the coronavirus.

Now Nermin Haidarpasic, a man who has one fight in the Octagon under his belt, in which he was destroyed by Alexander Poppeck, has tested him in the cage. Now the Swede has been given the opportunity to repair his reputation, having looked very resigned in his previous bout.

And in the fight with Foshum, he really delivered. With the exception of a good start by the Czech fighter and the last minute of the third round, Haidarpasic was better throughout the fight. Fošum looked harmless, he was pulling the fight to the net and he didn’t show any activity.

After all, even on Fošum’s face you could see who had the upper hand in the fight. Haidarpasic showed that he has great boxing and a good eye, he was able to avoid many hard punches. But it wasn’t enough to win. The fight ended in a points draw. And even the promoter Ondrej Novotny was surprised.

The next two fights didn’t last that long. They even ended in the first rounds and so the prelims card closed very quickly.

The first knockout was scored by Vaclav Mikulasek, who showed an interesting performance with Matyas Viszlay. The Slovak took the fight to the ground quickly, but Baba Jaga was active even from the bottom position and Viszlay didn’t like that.

Once the fight got back to standing, Mikulášek was better. He landed one knockdown and then delivered a clean KO as well, hitting his opponent right below the ribs and he went down. Baba Yaga then challenged Attila Vegh with a flourish.

The last fight of the prelims card offered arguably the KO of the year, and it was surprisingly taken care of by Mateusz Strzelczyk, one of the biggest underdogs of the entire tournament. He was the “worse” in his fight with Jorick Montagnac.

Montagnac hit Strzelczyk hard a few times, the Pole was stoned for a long time, yet he managed to avoid a lot of punches and then he landed the punches himself, sending Montagnac down with an incredible grenade.

Even promoter Ondrej Novotny was amazed. He revealed that he thought it was the biggest punch he had ever seen in the Octagon.

Main Card

King of the North lives up to his nickname, heavyweight surprise

The main card continued the set trend in the very first fight and we saw another finish. It was taken care of by home fighter and Liberec patriot Jan Malach, who was driven to victory by a sold-out Home Credit Arena.

In the first round he tried to get his knee on his opponent’s takedown attempt, but Ebrahim Hosseinpour reacted in time and “didn’t eat” him with his full strength. However, Malach unleashed an elbow, Hosseinpour failed to react and the referee stopped the fight at his passivity.

Adam Palasz and Lazar Todev faced off for a possible heavyweight title fight. The Polish fighter went into the fight as a clear favorite, only to fall short of that role. The tactical fight was won by the Bulgarian by a very close points.

Palasz had a better first round, but the bread was broken in the second round when Todev opened his opponent’s forehead with an elbow from a turn. A lot of blood started flowing and it didn’t stop flowing until the end of the fight.

The Pole was clearly upset, blood was pouring into his eyes, which only made the situation more difficult. Todev took the reins of the match and then he was better than Palasz. He deservedly won and took care of another surprise.

Skvor forced to tap out, Vemola won

Another fight, another surprise. At least according to the pre-fight odds and how much was bet on who. Daniel Skvor was looking to avenge a loss in December when he was knocked out in the first minute by Jorick Montagnac.

But he was now facing the seasoned Dan Vinni, a superb ground-and-pound fighter with experience of boxing without gloves. He offered the Czech a boxing-only fight, but he declined, as he had been training in wrestling and wanted to capitalize on it.

But after a minute, he might have regretted it. Vinni took advantage of the rejected challenge and his plan was clear. He was going to tighten up Skvor, and he succeeded, with a great heel hook Skvor had to tap out.

Karlos Vémola didn’t pull off the surprise, though it looked for a while like we might see it. The biggest underdog in the entire tournament, Al Matavao was given the opportunity to at least show some standup for a while, but he outboxed Vemola in that one, and so the Terminator started doing what he does best.

He got Matavao to the canvas, then took him to the ground and was right at home there. He worked patiently and on a rear-naked choke forced the Samoan fighter to tap out.

Magard has confirmed his position as champion!

The anticipated fight, the biggest challenge of the reigning champion’s career. Moreover, Jonas Magard hasn’t appeared in an MMA fight in a very long time. However, Gustavo Lopez constantly tried to upset him with his trash talk, he was confident and it showed in the fight.

Lopez didn’t react to Magard’s trahstalk, but it was the Dane’s hunger that really came through in the fight. Lopez hardly got anything going during the fight.

Magard dominated the standup from the beginning, hitting Lopez, while he himself responded to any efforts of his opponent with good movement. In the second round, he first hit Lopez with a knockdown, who got up quickly but was down again after a while.

The Dane thus confirmed that he is the rightful champion and scored his first successful defence.