With a card that’s being hailed as one of the most stacked in recent years rapidly approaching, Cage Warriors fans are being treated to an embarrassment of riches when it comes to the promotion’s return to London on November 15th.
Tickets for CW 180: London are availible here!
Two title fights, the return of TUF star Paddy McCory and a potential show-stealer between Adam Cullen and Tobias Harila; there’s something for everyone at London’s indigo at the O2.
In the latest edition of Fight Focus, Play-by-Play commentator Brad Wharton explores a bout with ‘Fight of the Night’ written all over it.
Return of the PrizeFighters
To say that the bantamweight clash between Alexander Lööf and Weslley Maia has Fight of the Night ‘written all over it’ would be something of an understatement.
If this fighter were a wall, it’d be absolutely caked in graffiti of the aforementioned phrase.
While ultimately not victorious in the tournament, the pair lit up their respective brackets and were responsible for some of the nights most memorable moments.
Shirzad Qadrian may have walked away with the fifty grand and the title shot, but as the dust settled in the post-PrizeFighter landscape, there was a lot of talk around where and when we’d next see some of the tournament’s leading lights.
It didn’t take long to get an answer from CW officials…but few could have anticipated just how mouth-watering that answer would be.
GB Top Team’s Weslley Maia is not stranger to making big impressions and leaving fans wanting more.
The Brazilian buzzsaw burst onto the scene in a big way back in 2018, stepping in on just 24 hours notice to face Jack Shore in the main event of CW 98 in Cardiff.
While he wasn’t victorious on the night, the guts he showed put people on notice.
When the Magic Man finally returned to the promotion with a full camp under his belt, he put on a clinic against Adam Wilson, breaking his opponent’s leg with a barrage of brutal low kicks and earning a legion of fans with his high energy style.
It’s been a rollercoaster ride for Maia, that much is true, but like any good rollercoaster there’s never been a dull moment.
In the years since his debut he’s developed immeasurably; now just as lethal with his ground game as he is when chopping people to pieces on the feet.
A signiture win over Lewis McGrillen outside the promotion, a split pair with eventual winner Shirzad Qadrian in the Famous Yellow Gloves; the division is still very much there for Maia’s taking.
And depending on the result of Qadrian’s upcoming bout with Liam Gittins, one big win could be all he needs…
Speaking of big impressions, they don’t make them much bigger than Alexander Lööf’s Cage Warriors debut.
Not just Fight of the Night, not just Fight of the Year…perhaps the greatest Cage Warriors fight of all time.
Lööf’s brawl with Luke Riley will go down in history as a masterpiece of ultraviolence; something beyond skill, training or technique.
It was a battle fought on sheer, bloody-minded power of will.
Lööf is much more than just one fight though; the Västerås man boasts an impressive resume stretching back to his amateur days tearing up the Scandinavian regional scene and the IMMAFs, where he really began to garner the attention of the wider community.
Blessed with a self-proclaimed ‘Right Hand from Hell’ and bolstered by a technically sound defensive skillset on the ground, Lööf possesses all the tools necessary to keep himself out of trouble while dishing out reems of punishment in return.
In that respect, he and Maia aren’t all that dissimilar.
In the run up to July’s bantamweight PrizeFighter tournament I was asked to write about the fight I wanted to see materialise from the draw.
For me, there was no hesitation.
On Friday, November 15th, my wish comes true.