Bellator’s impending debut at the Santa Ana Center in Albuquerque, NM now has a complete fight card line-up. The promotion announced Monday Bellator light heavyweight champion Christian M’Pumbu would defend his belt against summer series light heavyweight tournament winner Attila Vegh in the evening’s main event. Numerically, the event is Bellator 91.
Vegh, 27, bested Zelg Galesic, Emanuel Newton and Travis Wuiff to win the light heavyweight tournament and earn the title shot in the summer of 2012. He currently holds a professional MMA record of 28-4-2, but is undefeated in his four Bellator bouts.
M’Pumbu, 35, last competed at Bellator 55 in October 2011 where he lost to Travis Wuiff by unanimous decision in a non-title bout. He became the organization’s light heavyweight champion during season 4.
Also competing at Bellator 91 will be the semifinalists of season 8’s lightweight tournament. Jason Fischer steps in for an injured Tiger Sarnavskiy and will face David Rickels, 24, who bested Lloyd Woodard at Bellator 87 to advance in the tournament.
On the other side of the lightweight bracket, Saad Awad, 29, will square off against rising prospect Will Brooks. Awad stopped Guillaume DeLorenzi in just 31 seconds into the first round to move into the semifinals while Brooks, 26, bested Ricardo Tirloni via unanimous decision to advance his placement. Both of those bouts took place at Bellator 87.
In preliminary action at evening, accomplished women’s boxer Holly Holm will fight in mixed martial arts for the third time when she faces Katie Merrill. The bout will also mark the Albuquerque resident’s Bellator debut.
The main card for the event will air on Spike TV while preliminary action will be streamed live on Spike.com. The entire fight card is as follows:
Main card:
Christian M’Pumbu vs. Attila Vegh
Jason Fischer vs. David Rickels
Saad Awad vs. Will Brooks
Ed West vs. Josh Montoya
Preliminary card:
Holly Holm vs. Katie Merrill
Blas Avena vs. Lenny Lovato
Brennan Ward vs. Vadiano La Luz
Russell Wilson vs. Felipe Chavez
Josh Appelt vs. Josh Lanier
Adrian Cruz vs. Nick Gonzalez