Wednesday 14 July 2010

World Cup final, UFC 116

The 2010 World Cup final capped an interesting but largely uninspiring tournament on Sunday night. Andres Iniesta’s extra time goal gave Spain a deserved victory over an incredibly dirty Holland team, led by the evil Mark van Bommel.

Van Bommel’s ability to escape bookings for horrendous challenges became more and more amazing with each passing game, but the final just took the piss. Both van Bommel and Nigel de Jong should have been dismissed before half-time, although de Jong’s chest-high, studs-up tiger crane kick didn’t seem as bad as it should seeing as though it was Xabi Alonso he hit.

The best chance of the game fell to Holland’s Arjen Robben, but the ancient-looking winger couldn’t beat goalkeeper Iker Casillas after making Carles Puyol look like Alan Stubbs and racing clear of the Spanish defence.

David Villa should have scored, and won me £80 (shithouse), after Everton’s own Johnny Heitinga fell over while trying to deal with a difficult cross. Villa looked certain to break the deadlock, only for Heitinga to somehow swing his legs around and block the shot. The defender’s night took a turn for the worse in extra time though, as Howard Webb showed him a second yellow card for seemingly placing his hand on Iniesta’s shoulder.

Overall Spain are worthy winners and unquestionably the best team in international football. They weren’t as exciting to watch as the young German side that everyone is obsessing over, but the way they’re able to completely dictate the tempo of the game through midfield is brilliant.

Elsewhere in the world of professional sport, Brock Lesnar submitted Shane Carwin to become the undisputed UFC heavyweight champion. Lesnar weathered a brutal storm and looked dead and buried after Carwin battered him both standing and on the ground for the duration of the first round, only for the Minnesota native to rally back and secure a submission victory in the second.

Many observers claimed that referee Josh Rosenthal should have called an end to the fight during the opening five minutes, but Lesnar responded to the official’s orders to keep active and managed to absorb many of Carwin’s outrageously powerful punches with his forearms, keeping himself in the fight until the end of the round.

By the beginning of the second stanza Carwin was visibly tired - he later admitted that his legs were completely cramped up at that point – and Lesnar immediately smelled blood and successfully shot for a takedown. Landing in side control, Lesnar was able to mount Carwin but, quite shockingly, instead of trying to ground and pound his gassed out opponent, the former WWE superstar shifted into a triangle choke position and proceeded to stun the watching world by scoring the first submission win of his MMA career.

Despite being a hugely unpopular figure amongst hardcore MMA fans, Lesnar earned a lot of respect for the guts he showed in surviving Carwin’s onslaught – something that no other heavyweight was able to do in Carwin’s previous twelve outings. Even though Carwin didn’t finish Lesnar it appeared that he at least beat some humility into the champion, who spoke respectfully about his opponent during his post-fight interview.

Lesnar and Carwin headlined what turned out to be a fantastic card. Chris Lytle tapped out Matt Brown with a rarely-seen arm bar from a mounted crucifix position, cementing his status as the welterweight division’s premier gatekeeper.

Fight of the night honours went to Chris Leben and Yoshihiro Akiyama for their bloody three round war. Leben took the fight on extremely short notice, having stopped previously undefeated wrestler Aaron Simpson just two weeks prior to UFC 116, but he showed little sign of fatigue as he pulled out a third round triangle and submitted the world-ranked judoka.

Akiyama, who voiced his dissatisfaction at having to face Leben after Wanderlei Silva pulled out of the fight with a knee injury, looked good early on and was probably ahead on the score cards having used his world-class judo skills to take Leben down numerous times. The Japanese superstar’s cardio came into question late on though, as he allowed Leben to drag him into a stand-up war before gassing and getting caught in a triangle.

Another fight of the night contender was Stephan Bonnar vs Krzysztof Soszynski, which ended in a second round TKO victory for Bonnar, who downed his foe with a crushing knee before landing a barrage of punches to the downed Soszynski. The win snapped a three-fight losing streak for Bonnar.

George Sotiropoulos fired himself into title contention in the lightweight division after dominating Kurt Pellegrino over three rounds. Sotiropoulos controlled Pellegrino on the ground and outstruck him standing en route a unanimous decision victory.

Hopefully Gerald Harris has earned himself a future spot on the main card after KO’ing highly-touted prospect Dave Branch with a vicious power slam. Branch showed his lack of experience by trying to jump into a standing guillotine against a powerhouse wrestler like Harris, and the TUF 7 alumni took advantage of the situation, grabbing Branch's head before slamming him into the mat. The win was Harris’ third in a row in the Octagon and moved him to 19-2 in his MMA career.

It’s already been announced that Brock Lesnar’s next title defence will come against 8-0 wrestling juggernaut Cain Velasquez. In the wake of Lesnar getting tooled on the feet by Shane Carwin, many are speculating that Velasquez (who displayed excellent boxing in his bout with Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira) will beat Lesnar to the punch and have the cardio to finish what Carwin started.

I’m picking Lesnar though. No one in the division hits harder than Carwin and Lesnar was able to survive him, so I don’t see Velasquez finishing the champion either.