It was billed as a No. 1 contender’s bout in the light heavyweight division, but it was stacked in Alexander Gustafsson’s favor to get the job done. Yet despite fighting in his native Sweden in front of 30,000 people at the Tele2 Arena in St…
It was billed as a No. 1 contender’s bout in the light heavyweight division, but it was stacked in Alexander Gustafsson’s favor to get the job done. Yet despite fighting in his native Sweden in front of 30,000 people at the Tele2 Arena in Stockhold, the hometown hero Gustafsson was overwhelmed by Anthony Johnson in the wee hours of Sunday morning.
Gustafsson lost via a violent first round TKO to Johnson, who is now a perfect 3-0 as a light heavyweight in his second stint in the UFC.
Now instead of the highly coveted rematch between Jon Jones and Alexander Gustafsson, “Rumble” Johnson will take his new-found momentum into a collision with the current 205-pound champ.
Afterward, Gustafsson was emotional in defeat. He shed tears in the Octagon, and in the UFC on FOX 14 post-fight press conference, he explained the anguish he was feeling.
“It’s just a lot of pain,” he said. “I not only lost my fight, I lost my fight in front of 30,000 fans, so that’s a tough thing to deal with, and it still is. But whatever hurts you gets you stronger.”
Gustafsson was more than a 2-to-1 favorite coming in, and was still labeled as the No. 1 contender in the division. He had to clear the one last hurdle in Johnson, however, and he said the game plan was to use his length.
“My game plan was to work every round, tactically, with my distance and my speed,” he said. “But Anthony’s a beast and he came in with his pressure. He did what he had to do. And he did it good.”
The 30-year-old Johnson was humble in victory, and said that “pressure” was the key word in the equation.
“My game plan was to pressure and make him fight my kind of fight,” Johnson said. “That was all. I couldn’t let him get comfortable, because once he starts doing his Ali shuffle you know it’s about to be a long night for you.”
At one point in the fight, there was a moment where some people perceived a headbutt that may have played a factor in the outcome. Asked if he noticed a headbutt during the fight, Gustafsson said he wasn’t aware of it if it happened.
“No, I didn’t feel any headbutt,” he said. “So I don’t think it did, but what do I know?”
Asked what his plan was from here, a reticent Gustafsson said it was to get back on the horse and try again.
“I’m just going to take a few days and then go back to the gym and hit the bag,” he said. “Always learn from your mistakes and I learned today that I need to keep my guard up. So that’s it.”
This is the UFC on FOX 14 live blog for Dan Henderson vs. Gegard Mousasi, a middleweight bout at Saturday night’s UFC event at the Tele2 Arena in Stockholm on Saturday night.Henderson, who has lost four of his past five fights, will face Mou…
Perhaps it’s telling of just how good things have been so far in 2015 that Alexander Gustafsson — The Man Who Nearly Beat Jon Jones — is quietly sneaking up on a stakes-stacked main event this weekend. Here is Gustafsson getting ready to remake his claim to a rematch in front of 30,000 throaty partisans in his native Sweden while America deals with a blinding Conor McGregor hangover. Thems are the spoils right there.
Under any circumstance in 2014, Gustafsson vs. Anthony Johnson for the right to Jones would have felt a little bit extraordinary. It will air on FOX in the States, with the fights happening at the ungodly hour of 4 a.m. locally. That’s reminiscent of “The Rumble in the Jungle” in 1974, back when Ali and Foreman made history in the wee hours in Zaire. In Scandinavia, it’ll be icy blondes and tundra in the backdrop rather than B.B. King and Mobutu Sese Seko, but otherwise you can dub this one, “The ‘Rumble’ in the IKEA.”
This event will be the second-largest gate in terms of the sheer volume of souls stuffed through the turnstiles, second only to UFC 129, when 55,000 turned out to watch Georges St-Pierre slowly drain Jake Shields of his vitality in Toronto. Sweden loves its challenger the way it did Ingemar Johansson half-a-century ago. Should Gustafsson win, he punches his ticket back to Jones, which for a little while there was the hottest rematch conceivable.
You remember that first fight at UFC 165. It was everything we ever wanted in a title fight. It was Gustafsson executing the unthinkable. It was Jones being forced to dig deep and adapt. It was Gustafsson showing guts and Jones showing heart and all kinds of plot twists in between.
So how’d we get sidetracked from the sequel? What happened?
A pothole became a vortex, is what happened! Jones wasn’t keen on an immediate rematch, which led to a title defense against Glover Teixeira, which led to Gustafsson and Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, who morphed into Jimi Manuwa, who quickly became mincemeat. After some pages flew off the calendar, that led to Gustafsson-Jones II, which was halted when Gustafsson suffered a minor knee injury, which led to Daniel Cormier stepping in on his own bum knee. With the feud between Cormier and Jones becoming part of the American pastime, Gustafsson lost his place.
It’s been a lot of damn craziness.
Too much craziness just to get back to the possibility of the thing we were originally pining for, back before we were pining in different directions. The consolation for Gustafsson’s wait is this weekend’s bout with Johnson in Stockholm, which becomes his chance to once again ignite the passion for his rematch with Jones. Now that Cormier and Jones has played out, and Jones is still the guy, the most intriguing rematch conceivable begins to come back into focus.
And that’s where we are. Gustafsson has it within his power to redeclare — emphatically — his rematch with Jones, a fight that has lived in limbo for far too long.
Only thing is… this isn’t Lil’ Nog or Manuwa that Gustafsson is dealing with, it’s “Rumble” Johnson, the one-time troubled welterweight who has reimagined himself as a hulk of a light heavyweight. When Gustafsson’s (sometime) training partner Phil Davis began looking through Johnson to see Jon Jones at UFC 172, he got dismantled. Not that Gustafsson will do the same, but Johnson is carrying a lot of disruption in his hands. Should Gustafsson take one of those powerbombs that Johnson downed Nogueira with in July, Gustafsson may drift away from that Jones rematch for years to come.
With Jones’ flirtation of moving to heavyweight at some point, Gustafsson may cede his right to a rematch for good.
That’s why this fight means a lot not just for Gustafsson, but for the country he’s fighting in on Saturday. Sweden goes as Gustafsson goes. Likewise, Johnson could put the Gustafsson-Jones rematch forever in pending. By doing so, he’d get his own title shot, where new narratives bury the old.
There’s a lot hanging in the balance in Sweden.
Any time you’re dealing in fortune swings like this, it’s fun; nothing stokes a gambler’s libido quite like the possibility of ruin. And that there will be 30,000 people at this afterhours club who’re well aware of the fact makes it not only fun, but also pretty damn unique.
Perhaps it’s telling of just how good things have been so far in 2015 that Alexander Gustafsson — The Man Who Nearly Beat Jon Jones — is quietly sneaking up on a stakes-stacked main event this weekend. Here is Gustafsson getting ready to remake his claim to a rematch in front of 30,000 throaty partisans in his native Sweden while America deals with a blinding Conor McGregor hangover. Thems are the spoils right there.
Under any circumstance in 2014, Gustafsson vs. Anthony Johnson for the right to Jones would have felt a little bit extraordinary. It will air on FOX in the States, with the fights happening at the ungodly hour of 4 a.m. locally. That’s reminiscent of “The Rumble in the Jungle” in 1974, back when Ali and Foreman made history in the wee hours in Zaire. In Scandinavia, it’ll be icy blondes and tundra in the backdrop rather than B.B. King and Mobutu Sese Seko, but otherwise you can dub this one, “The ‘Rumble’ in the IKEA.”
This event will be the second-largest gate in terms of the sheer volume of souls stuffed through the turnstiles, second only to UFC 129, when 55,000 turned out to watch Georges St-Pierre slowly drain Jake Shields of his vitality in Toronto. Sweden loves its challenger the way it did Ingemar Johansson half-a-century ago. Should Gustafsson win, he punches his ticket back to Jones, which for a little while there was the hottest rematch conceivable.
You remember that first fight at UFC 165. It was everything we ever wanted in a title fight. It was Gustafsson executing the unthinkable. It was Jones being forced to dig deep and adapt. It was Gustafsson showing guts and Jones showing heart and all kinds of plot twists in between.
So how’d we get sidetracked from the sequel? What happened?
A pothole became a vortex, is what happened! Jones wasn’t keen on an immediate rematch, which led to a title defense against Glover Teixeira, which led to Gustafsson and Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, who morphed into Jimi Manuwa, who quickly became mincemeat. After some pages flew off the calendar, that led to Gustafsson-Jones II, which was halted when Gustafsson suffered a minor knee injury, which led to Daniel Cormier stepping in on his own bum knee. With the feud between Cormier and Jones becoming part of the American pastime, Gustafsson lost his place.
It’s been a lot of damn craziness.
Too much craziness just to get back to the possibility of the thing we were originally pining for, back before we were pining in different directions. The consolation for Gustafsson’s wait is this weekend’s bout with Johnson in Stockholm, which becomes his chance to once again ignite the passion for his rematch with Jones. Now that Cormier and Jones has played out, and Jones is still the guy, the most intriguing rematch conceivable begins to come back into focus.
And that’s where we are. Gustafsson has it within his power to redeclare — emphatically — his rematch with Jones, a fight that has lived in limbo for far too long.
Only thing is… this isn’t Lil’ Nog or Manuwa that Gustafsson is dealing with, it’s “Rumble” Johnson, the one-time troubled welterweight who has reimagined himself as a hulk of a light heavyweight. When Gustafsson’s (sometime) training partner Phil Davis began looking through Johnson to see Jon Jones at UFC 172, he got dismantled. Not that Gustafsson will do the same, but Johnson is carrying a lot of disruption in his hands. Should Gustafsson take one of those powerbombs that Johnson downed Nogueira with in July, Gustafsson may drift away from that Jones rematch for years to come.
With Jones’ flirtation of moving to heavyweight at some point, Gustafsson may cede his right to a rematch for good.
That’s why this fight means a lot not just for Gustafsson, but for the country he’s fighting in on Saturday. Sweden goes as Gustafsson goes. Likewise, Johnson could put the Gustafsson-Jones rematch forever in pending. By doing so, he’d get his own title shot, where new narratives bury the old.
There’s a lot hanging in the balance in Sweden.
Any time you’re dealing in fortune swings like this, it’s fun; nothing stokes a gambler’s libido quite like the possibility of ruin. And that there will be 30,000 people at this afterhours club who’re well aware of the fact makes it not only fun, but also pretty damn unique.
Not only is Mirko Cro Cop back in the UFC, but now he’s booked into a fight against his old nemesis, Gabriel Gonzaga.
The UFC’s senior vice president and general manager of Europe, David Allen, announced the fight during a press conference f…
Not only is Mirko Cro Cop back in the UFC, but now he’s booked into a fight against his old nemesis, Gabriel Gonzaga.
The UFC’s senior vice president and general manager of Europe, David Allen, announced the fight during a press conference from Stockholm, Sweden on Friday. Cro Cop-Gonzaga II will headline the UFC’s foray into Poland. That event will take place in Krakow on April 11.
Cro Cop and Gonzaga previously met at UFC 70 in Manchester, England, in 2007, and to this day remains one of the more memorable fights in UFC history. After a storied career in Pride FC, Cro Cop was closing in on a title shot in the heavyweight division, but the Brazilian “Napao” downed the Croatian fighter with a spectacular head kick late in the first round.
The 40-year old Cro Cop (30-11-2) is coming off of back-to-back wins over Satoshi Ishii in Japan. He also competed in the kickboxing promotion, Glory, where he defeated Jarrell Miller in June.
Gonzaga (16-9) is riding a two-fight losing streak, the latest coming this past December against Matt Mitrione at UFC on FOX 13 in Phoenix. He lost via first-round TKO (strikes).
The UFC also announced a light heavyweight co-main event between England-based fighter Jimi Manuwa against Poland’s own Jan Blachowicz. Manuwa is coming off the first defeat of his professional MMA career, which came at the hands of Alexander Gustafsson back in March of 2014. Blachowicz had a successful UFC debut this past October, as he defeated Ilir Latifi at UFC Fight Night 53 via first round TKO.
UFC Fight Night Poland will take place on April 11 at the Krakow Arena.
Looks like the UFC will be breaking new ground in Europe in 2015.
During a press conference from Stockholm, Sweden — which featured on-stage appearances by Scotish fighter Joanne Calderwood, Poland’s Jan Blachowicz and Germany’s Nick Hein -…
Looks like the UFC will be breaking new ground in Europe in 2015.
During a press conference from Stockholm, Sweden — which featured on-stage appearances by Scotish fighter Joanne Calderwood, Poland’s Jan Blachowicz and Germany’s Nick Hein — the UFC announced three new European dates.
The UFC will make its inaugural visit to Krakow, Poland, on April 11. It will also return to Berlin, Germany, to the O2 Arena on June 20. The Octagon will also visit Scotland for the first time on July 18. That show will take place at the Hydro SSE Hydro Arena, which has a seating configuration to hold 13,000 people.
David Allen, the UFC’s Senior Vice President and General Manager of Europe, Middle East and Africa, also said that more dates would be announced in Europe in weeks to come.
Benson Henderson said he wanted to fight again as soon as possible upon dropping a narrow decision to Donald Cerrone this past Sunday in Boston. As of Thursday, “Smooth” got his wish.
Henderson (21-5) will step in for the injured Bobby Green…
Benson Henderson said he wanted to fight again as soon as possible upon dropping a narrow decision to Donald Cerrone this past Sunday in Boston. As of Thursday, “Smooth” got his wish.
Henderson (21-5) will step in for the injured Bobby Green and face Jorge Masvidal in the co-main event of UFC FIght Night 63 on April 4. The news of the replacement came via Damon Martin of Fox Sports, and was later confirmed by the UFC.
At UFC Fight Night 59, Henderson came up on the short end of a debatable decision against Cerrone. Afterwards, he told Joe Rogan in the post-fight speech that the UFC could book him again immediately. “You’ve got to accept it. You’ve got to man up and move on.”
That’s what the former lightweight champion will do against the ever-dangerous Masvidal, who has won three straight decisions in the UFC, the last coming against James Krause at UFC 178 in September. Masvidal (28-8) has been hovering in the top-15 of the 155-pound division since the Strikeforce merger, and has won six of seven fights overall.
A win over Henderson could solidify him as a contender in the lightweight division.
The 31-year old Henderson will be trying to snap a two-fight skid in the UFC, the first time in his career where he’s suffered back-to-back losses.
