Zuluzinho went from being in mount working for a submission to knocked out in the span of 10 seconds after a stand-up call from the referee.
350-pound super-heavyweight Zuluzinho was back in action over the weekend, fighting Petr Romankevich in the main event of AMC Fight Nights 114.
Things were looking good for the hulking Brazilian fighter early as he got on top of Romankevich and was working towards an armlock. Unfortunately, even the threat of a submission finish from mount wasn’t enough to stop the referee from standing the fighters back up, where Romankevich turned the tables quickly and KO’d “Zulu” badly.
The clip from Minsk, Belarus was shared on Twitter via Grabaka_Hitman and it’s pretty ugly.
Holy shit that was bad pic.twitter.com/OudfTvvfgE
— caposa (@Grabaka_Hitman) September 3, 2022
As for why the referee stood the fight back up, AMC Fight Nights Global president Kamil Hajiyev recently instituted a one-minute rule for ground fighting.
“From now on, in AMC Fight Nights, from the moment when the athletes were on the ground, the judges count exactly one minute,” Hajiyev announced on his promotion’s social media accounts. “And after one minute, at the command of the timekeeper, the referee raises the athletes to the rack.”
“It doesn’t matter what happens at that moment – a bright finishing move, a painful hold, or something else. The minute ended, and the one who was in a dominant position did not use his chance, and the one who was not in it simply survived and used his chance to save. Therefore, a minute – and the parterre is completed.”
Hajiyev concluded saying “I hope that the new rules will refresh Russian MMA.”
It certainly refreshed Romankevich’s chances of winning, considering how difficult getting Zuluzinho off him would have been. He moves to 5-1 in MMA.
The loss drops Zuluzinho (real name Wagner da Conceicao Martins) to 0-2 in his AMC Fight Nights Global run. Prior to that, he went on a 3-0 run for Serbian promotion Megdan. “Zulu” is best known for his work in the mid-2000s, when he was a favorite on the Japanese MMA circuit. He fought for K-1 and PRIDE against opponents like Butterbean, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, and Fedor Emelianenko.
At 44 years old, he’s definitely getting too old to be taking damage like this.