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Akira Corassani will be looking for a better result in his home country this time aroiund.

Corassani, a Sweden native, will meet Sam Sicilia at UFC on FOX 14 on Jan. 24 in Stockholm, the UFC announced Thursday. The card is expected to draw upwards of 30,000 people to Tele2 Arena. Corassani is coming off a knockout loss to Max Holloway in Sweden back in October.

Sicilia (13-5) is also coming off a defeat and has fallen in three of his last four bouts. Last time out, the Washington state native lost to Katsunori Kikuno by submission in September. The 28-year-old is only 2-4 in the UFC since moving down to featherweight, but he remains one of the most exciting fighters in the division.

Corassani (12-5, 1 NC) is looking to get back on track after consecutive losses to ranked featherweights Holloway and Dustin Poirier. Before that, he had won three straight and was on the verge of cracking the top 15. The 32-year-old Ultimate Fighter alum trains out of Renzo Gracie Academy in New York.

UFC on FOX 14 is headlined by a light heavyweight title eliminator between Alexander Gustafsson and Anthony Johnson. The co-main event is slated to be Dan Henderson against Gegard Mousasi. Phil Davis and Ryan Bader will also clash on the card. The show could end up being one of the biggest ever on FOX if the current lineup remains unchanged.

Brendan Schaub had some criticism for Travis Browne’s decision to leave Jackson-Winkeljohn MMA to join Ronda Rousey’s coach Edmond Tarverdyan at Glendale Fighting Club. Schaub called the move “100 percent” a mistake.

Tarverdyan fired back on Monday’s The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani.

“Honestly, somebody asked me if he can fight,” Tarverdyan said. “I think he can’t fight for s—. That’s what I think.”

Browne and Schaub meet at UFC 181: Hendricks vs. Lawler II on Saturday night in Las Vegas in a pivotal heavyweight bout. Browne left Jackson’s to train with Tarverdyan for this camp and Schaub was extremely critical of the decision on Joe Rogan’s podcast in September.

“Obviously, I know Ronda very well and I know that camp pretty well,” Schaub said. “I’m not going to go into detail but I think it’s a great thing for me that he’s training there. I’ll put it like that. I think it’s a good thing for me.”

Tarverdyan said that Schaub’s comments might stem from the fact that Schaub once wanted to train at Glendale Fighting Club in Los Angeles and Tarverdyan wasn’t interested.

“I pick and choose my fighters, I’ll tell you this much for sure,” Tarverdyan said. “It’s the way they approach me and the way they speak to me before they really want to be in my gym and train with me. I have heard that he did want to work with me and I said that’s not the way it’s going to be happening. So, stuff like that has happened, so I don’t know if there’s hard feelings or not. It really doesn’t matter at this point. I don’t want to cause any unnecessary drama.”

Tarverdyan said he watched Schaub’s fight with Andrei Arlovski at UFC 174 in June and came away unimpressed. The coach said Schaub had Arlovski on the ground and could not hurt him.

“I didn’t see anything special,” Tarverydan said. “Nothing really happened to the guy. A heavyweight punching on the ground, you have to do some damage, you know what I mean? There’s other fighters out there in the 135-pound division, even Ronda, when she hits someone on the ground it’s totally different.”

Tarverdyan said he has also warned Browne about Schaub’s stalling tactics, saying Schaub doesn’t fight, he just “survives” in the Octagon.

“It’s not gonna happen,” Tarverdyan said. “I talked about that with Travis. He’s aware. That’s why you have to be working all the time, not letting him mindf— you, try to hold onto you or anything like that, for you to get off what you’re supposed to do. And you get a win like that? It’s not right. It doesn’t look good. It’s embarrassing. It’s something that I would never want to see. The fans and the crowds, everybody — I don’t think anybody enjoys that.”

Either way, Tarverdyan said he was unconcerned with Schaub’s comments and he would prefer to just focus on the athletes he’s working with.

“I have fighters in the gym,” Tarverdyan said. “I’m less worried about what he thinks. I’ve got champions in the gym. I’ve been doing this since I was 16 years old and I’ve had my own gym and I’ve been successful with what I’ve been doing.”

CM Punk is a huge fan of MMA, has a major following from his days with WWE and has trained for years in Brazilian jiu-jitsu under the Gracies. So would UFC president Dana White hear what he has to say about fighting in the UFC?

Why not?

“He is a big fan,” White told TMZ. “I like him very much. He’s a great dude. I don’t know if he can fight or anything like that, but sure. I wouldn’t mind talking to CM Punk.”

Punk did say last week on Colt Cabana’s Art of Wrestling podcast that he has a no-compete clause with UFC in his WWE termination contract, so any type of business relationship would likely have to wait until the summer. CM Punk said Alberto Del Rio, another recently ousted WWE star, has similar language in his deal. Del Rio once competed in MMA under the name “Dos Caras, Jr.” and fought Mirko Cro Cop in PRIDE.

“Just like UFC is not WWE’s competition, but you can’t go work there for a year after they fire you on your wedding day,” Punk told Cabana.

White was also asked about current WWE champion and former UFC heavyweight champ Brock Lesnar, whose WWE deal reportedly expires in April. White said last month at the Time Is Now press conference that he has heard Lesnar is interested in restarting his MMA career. Bellator MMA president Scott Coker said on The MMA Hour on Monday that he would also be interested in pursuing Lesnar.

“I have a great relationship with Brock,” White said. “He’s with the WWE doing his thing. If and when his deal is up with them and he wants to fight, I’m sure he’ll call me.”

Brandon Vera could not be happier with ONE FC. He’s just rubbed the wrong way by how things ended between him and his former employer.

Vera told MMA Fighting that after he turned down the UFC’s initial contract extension offer earlier this year, he found out from social media that he had been released from the organization. No one from the UFC picked up the phone to call him first.

“It wasn’t handled the way it should be,” said Vera, who had been with the organization for nine years. “I was a loyal employee, never did anything incorrectly. Never beat up my wife. Never had a DUI. The respect wasn’t there.”

Vera (12-7, 1 NC) said he reinjured his broken hand in a loss to Ben Rothwell at UFC 164 in August 2013. He didn’t rush and wanted to make sure it healed correctly before taking another fight. In the spring, he had discussions with the UFC about extending his contract and he turned down the offer.

According to Vera, UFC president Dana White then phoned him to see if they could work out a deal.

“Let’s talk about this,” Vera said White told him. “Let’s fix this. I’d really like to have you finish out your career here. I said, ‘OK.’ He said, ‘I’ll call you back when I get back from China.’ He never called me back.”

Just a few days later, Vera was stunned to learn from social media that he had been released by the UFC. He called White and left a message. He said White didn’t return his call. Then, the offers began rolling in from other organizations, including ONE FC, Vera said. By the time Vera and White spoke again, Vera already had a significant offer from ONE FC.

“He said, ‘Congrats kids, you and Asia make sense,'” Vera said of his conversation with White.

Vera said he has no hard feelings with White in particular. He just wishes UFC brass handled things differently. But it didn’t matter anyway, because he loved everything ONE FC was offering him — including a big bout in the Philippines. Vera is a Filipino-American and it has always been his dream to fight in the country. He will get that chance Friday in the co-main event of ONE FC: Warrior’s Way against Igor Subora.

“I had no interest in UFC anymore at all,” Vera said. “It worked out 100 percent in my favor.”

Aside from the financial points of the contract, Vera is most pleased with how he has been treated thus far by ONE FC and its CEO Victor Cui. Respect is Vera’s big buzzword and he said ONE FC treats every fight “like a modern-day samurai.”

“We do it for the money,” Vera said. “We do it for the fame. Some guys do it for the girls. Everybody has their own reason for doing it. One thing all fighters can agree about is respect. Chances, money and women is not respect. That comes with the business. Respect is its own self.”

Vera, 37, has watched some of the videos Wanderlei Silva has put out on YouTube over the last few months and believes Silva makes some good points. He thinks the UFC has issues and fighters are starting to see the light. Vera hopes a fighters union will be developed one day.

“It’s being noticed,” Vera said. “Who’s really making the money? People are bleeding, breaking bones, sweating and putting themselves on the line 100 percent of the time. Some normal people would say, ‘Go get another job.’ It’s hard when you’re locked into a contract.”

Vera sees ONE FC as part of the new frontier and believes people in the U.S. don’t realize the company’s popularity in Asia. He said he was swarmed with fans and media during press events in Manila leading up to Warrior’s Way.

“ONE FC is a whole different monster than the UFC,” Vera said. “UFC is huge in America and the UK, Australia, a couple different places. The projected viewership in ONE FC is a billion viewers. They’re in China. They’re not in Macao or Hong Kong. They’re in China.”

Added Vera of the UFC: “If you want a race, you’re already behind. If people want to doubt me, that’s OK. Just follow the numbers. You don’t have to believe me. Just watch.”

Vera was once one of the top prospects in all of MMA and vowed to win titles at both heavyweight and light heavyweight. It didn’t work out for him in the UFC, but “The Truth” believes he might have found the place he can spend the rest of his fighting days.

“It was the perfect fit,” Vera said. “Good isn’t the word. Perfect is the word. It’s just meant to be.”

NEW YORK — Anthony Pettis believes Gilbert Melendez will be one of his toughest opponents and is undoubtedly among the best fighters in the lightweight division. The UFC 155-pound champion just thinks Melendez’s career path and his own trajectory are going in opposite directions.

“I feel like he’s on his way out of the peak of his career, and I’m just entering it,” Pettis told MMA Fighting at a media lunch Monday in Manhattan. “I think his peak of his career, I wouldn’t say it’s past, but he’s not starting it anymore. I’m just starting to tap into my grown-man strength, my full potential, my knowledge of fighting. I’m very confident in this fight.”

Pettis will defend his belt for the first time against Melendez in the co-main event of UFC 181 on Saturday night in Las Vegas. Pettis is more than a 2-to-1 favorite, but many think Melendez, with his versatile skillset, will give “Showtime” a tough go. Pettis does not doubt that at all. But he sees Melendez’s biggest possibility at victory as taking him down and grinding him out, like Clay Guida did to Pettis in Pettis’ last loss in 2011.

“I don’t really have an elaborate game plan or anything like that,” Pettis said. “He’s a tough guy. Good boxing. I know he’s gonna try to wrestle me. Anybody that fights me is going to try to wrestle me, take me down — Clay Guida. I’m not afraid of anything. He most likely won’t knock me out. He most likely won’t submit me. He might take me down and hold me down. The only thing I’m afraid of is losing a decision. As long as I keep that mindset to win at the end of the rounds, I’ll be fine.”

Pettis (17-2) has not fought since winning the lightweight title from Benson Henderson at UFC 164 on Aug. 31, 2013 due to a knee injury. The Milwaukee native said he could have come back in August or September, but the Melendez bout was scheduled for December because both men are coaching opposite each other on The Ultimate Fighter this season.

Melendez (22-3) is also coming off a long layoff. “El Nino” hasn’t competed since beating Diego Sanchez at UFC 166 on Oct. 19, 2013. Pettis doesn’t really believe in ring rust, but either way this is a level playing field in his eyes.

Pettis said some might be underestimating him in this fight, because the perception is that his ground game is behind his athletic, technical striking. That might be the case, but he has five career submissions, including the first-round armbar against Henderson last year. Only one other person had ever tapped Henderson in his career before that.

Pettis believes that since he’s finished his last three fights in the first round people haven’t been able to see his full arsenal. He thinks he might get a chance to show that off Saturday — if Melendez lasts that long, he said.

“They haven’t seen how my game has changed and how good I’ve actually got,” Pettis said. “If Melendez is tough enough to make it out of the first round, they’re actually going to see how good my game is.”

El Sábado 6 de Diciembre, Johny Hendricks y Robbie Lawler se enfrentarán en una de las revanchas más esperadas de 2014 y que pondrá en juego el cinturón de las 170 libras. Por si fuera poco, la co-estelar del UFC 181 será protagonizada por Anthony Pettis y Gilbert Melendez. “Showtime” expondrá el título de los ligeros ante “El Niño” después de que ambos fueran coaches de la temporada 20 de “The Ultimate Fighter”. ¡Aquí algunos de sus números!-Johny Hendricks es el p … Read the Full Article Here