Coming off a loss in his last fight to Ryan Bader at UFC 119, Antônio Rogério “Minotouro” Nogueira (19-4) is looking for a big win in his fourth UFC bout on March 26. A winner of a “Fight of the Night” and a “Knockout of the Night” bonus, Nogueira looks to impress once again when he meets Phil “Mr. Wonderful” Davis in the main event of UFC Fight Night: Nogueira vs. Davis (aka UFC Fight Night 24).
Originally slotted to meet Tito Ortiz, Nogueira has been steadily preparing himself to meet “The Huntington Beach Bad Boy” but a freak accident this past week has forced Ortiz out after receiving over 20 stitches to his head after a training accident. Davis was tagged to step in as a replacement, which suits Nogueira just fine as he sees a lot of similarities between the two fighters.
“Minotouro” is still predicting the same result though, a knockout for him.
“My work’s done, man, the thing is to focus and train hard to face this new opponent. I still didn’t have the chance to watch many of his fights, but his game is similar to Tito Ortiz’s. I know he tends to use his kicks more, but his strong point also is Wrestling… The same background. I’m training too hard, everything’s perfect now. You can hope an aggressive me, I’ll really go for it this time. I just have to prevent the takedowns, but I’ll attack him, I’ll try to finish it and the good positions. My plan is to knock him out. He’ll have to fight a tough guy, it’ll be a good fight. I’ll make a difference with my Boxing skills, it’ll be my game plan so I keep the distance.”
HT: Quote and photo via Tatame.com