EFC Fight Night 2 Wrap Up

In an attempt to finish off the year with EFC 100, the EFC Organisation staged their second Fight Night event at the EFC Performance Institute in Johannesburg, South Africa on Saturday night.

It was a Brave opening of the Main Card with the first 2 encounters having very much a Brave FC feel about them. The opening bantamweight bout saw  Zimbabwe’s Nicholas Hwende – sporting Brave FC fight shorts – dominate Angola’s Eduardo Barros. Hwende was able to take Barros to the ground at will and even when Barros looked to turn the tables with his own takedowns, Hwende was able to transition into top control with relative ease. The unanimous decision win for Hwende ensures that he continues his superb start to his professional career, climbing to 3-0. For Barros, he slipped to 1-1.

The flyweight bout between former Brave FC headliner, Dansheel ‘Buddha’ Moodley and rising prospect, Gift ‘The Day’ Walker had the commentary team at their biased best, talking up the experience of Moodley at the expense of Walker. An exciting first round showed that Walker is not just a submission artist, he has some serious power in those hands and Moodley was unable to gather himself resulting in a defeat on his return to the EFC Organisation. Walker moves to 3-0 leaving a few questions about the chin of Moodley.

Dayne ‘Quiet Storm’ van Wyk (2-0) continued her winning ways with a clinical performance against Kenyan debutant Peris ‘Iron Lady’ Githiga. The opening round showed how Van Wyk has evolved as a young prospect with her crisp striking and good movement. Githiga showed heart and the fact that she has a good chin, unfortunately she was no match for Van Wyk who made short work of matters midway through the second round with her first professional finish.

Bradley ‘The Nightmare’ Swanepoel (4-0) added to his family legacy with three rounds of dominant ground work over the ever-eccentric Tumisang ‘The President’ Madiba (9-12). Despite giving up reversals in both the 1^st and 2^nd rounds, Swanepoel was just too much for Madiba, who can take heart from the fact that he is the first athlete to make Swanepoel go the distance in his fight career.

The main event saw South Africa’s Nkazimulo ‘Zuluboy’ Zulu take on Brazil’s Gian ‘Patolino’ Souza in a bantamweight bout for the right to face current flyweight champ, Luthando Biko. Yes, you read that correctly – the winner of the Bantamweight Title Eliminator would get the opportunity to drop down to Flyweight and fight for the title!!!!?

If that was not bizarre enough, the fight itself was an absolute barnstormer tarnished by bizarre officiating. At the end of round one, many would have been reasonably confident that the doctors would have stopped the fight due to the almost instantaneous swelling of Zulu’s right eye – Souza has power and that eye was proof! History will now tell us that was not the case and as fight fans, we are all incredibly grateful because what followed was a masterclass of determination, guts, heart and true fighting spirit. 

Zulu, knowing that he was handicapped with only one good eye, threw absolute caution to the wind along with everything else he had. A visibly gassed Souza could do nothing but defend and ultimately lie on top of Zulu following a successful takedown. From his back, Zulu was the more active and far more aggressive of the two which had this writer wondering when the ref would stand the two athletes up….

The third round was nothing short of complete domination from the cyclopsian Zulu, who despite every effort, was unable to finish Souza meaning that the judges would be called upon to decide the winner, and what a bizarre decision it was!

If we accept that Souza won the first round and that Zulu dominated the third round to such an extent that you could easily argue for a 10-8, the only question would be – who did enough in the second round? As mentioned previously, Zulu was more active and more of an aggressor and yet, as is a regular feature with MMASA officials and their blundering, the bout was scored as a draw!

The result means that we still do not have a Bantamweight contender to the Flyweight strap and fans will have to either wait on either a rematch or possibly for another weight division concoction by the EFC to determine who Biko faces next.

In other news, following on his TKO loss to Robert Swanepoel, Masefi Ngoma was rushed to hospital. We wish him all the best and a speedy recovery and hope to give an update once we know more.

As previously mentioned in our article “3 Critical Questions Coming Out of EFC 92”, JP Kruger announced that he will face the winner of the rematch between Tresor and Michaels once that fight date is announced.

Final thoughts on the event, if the EFC is the banner carrier for African MMA then the sport is in trouble! Athletes calling for title shots – and being given them – after just four professional fights is not only immature, it lacks any form of logic and is an indictment on the state of the the sport, the amateur ranks, here in South Africa. Then again, the EFC is encouraging this behaviour especially if one considers the recent title fight between Pupanga Tresor and Luke Michael and now the EFC 94 Title fight between Sindile Manengela and Cameron Saaiman! I get the fact that many athletes see the EFC as a stepping stone for bigger promotions, but none of the bigger promotions are interested in a 4-0 or 5-0 fighter out of Africa when there are hundreds, if not thousands with similar records across Europe and the USA!

Prelim Results are as follows:

Pietie Coxen def. Wade Henderson via Submission (Strikes) – Round 2 (4:06)

Tapiwa Katikati def. Guelor Sondi via Sub (Rear Naked Choke) – Round 2 (3:21)

Stephan de la Rey def. Zwelibanzi Ngema via KO (Knee Knockout) – Round 1 (1:30)

Guide Moyo def. Warren Richards via TKO (Strikes) – Round 1 (4:34)

Dylan Swanepoel def. Musa Sethwape via Sub (Triangle Choke) – Round 1 (3:06)

Robert Swanepoel def. Masefi Ngoma via TKO (Strikes) – Round 2 (0:39)

Bheki Ngcobo def. Christian Mulamba via Unanimous Decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28)

PERFORMANCE BONUSES: Eduardo Barros, Nicholas Hwende, and Stephan de la Rey

FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: Nkazimulo Zulu vs Gian Souza

Photo Credit: Courtesy EFC