With only three weeks left before Fighting and Entertainment Group’s latest event, DREAM.16, the promotion announced three more bouts to it’s thin Sept. 25 card.
Made official at the press conference was a non-title bout between DREAM lightweight champ Shinya Aoki (24-5) vs. Marcus Aurelio (20-8), former DREAM lightweight champ Joachim Hansen (19-10-1) will move to featherweight to face Kazuyuki Miyata (9-7), and a second featherweight bout between Takeshi “Lion” Inoue (18-4) vs. Kazuyuki Miyata (9-7).
DREAM officials reconfirmed the light-heavyweight bout between Gegard Mousasi and Tatsuya Mizuno for the vacant DREAM title.
A bout between Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Jason “Mayhem” Miller was also made official after the promotion posted a promo video for the fight on their YouTube page.
“When I see Marcus Aurelio, I see him through the image of Gomi. While Gomi’s doing his best fighting in the states now, my hope is to do well in Japan and not lose [to Aurelio]. I’m on the same track as Gomi, I think. I’d like to have an opportunity to fight Gomi in the future,” said Aoki, who later asserted that though he isn’t aiming for Gomi per se, he has expected to cross paths with the former Pride champ someday.
“I don’t know why, but there’s a lot of negative information these days, and I want brighten up the combat sports world,” Aoki commented. “At today’s press conference, there were some questions that were asked that should have been handled online. We as fighters grow tired of some of these questions. I just want to do my best, fight well and brighten things with my fight in Nagoya.”
(props to Sherdog.com for the transcription)
The updated DREAM.16 card is as follows:
Middleweight bout: Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Jason Miller
Lightweight bout: Shinya Aoki vs. Marcus Aurelio
Featherweight bout: Kazuyuki Miyata vs. Takeshi Inoue
Featherweight bout: Hideo Tokoro vs. Joachim Hansen
Light Heavyweight Championship bout: Gegard Mousasi vs. Tatsuya Mizuno