Photo by Todd Samson for TapouT magazine
Bellator Fighting Championships is set to begin it’s sixth season next month starting on March 9, 2012.
Part of that new season includes a welterweight title match between current champion Ben ‘Funky’ Askren and season five tournament winner, Douglas ‘The Phenom’ Lima. Both men are set to meet on April 6 at Caesar’s Windsor in Windsor, Ontario in the main event of Bellator 64.
In a recent interview with the DetroitNews.com, both men had a chance to talk about their upcoming bout.
Lima, who has won nine straight including winning and defending the Maximum Fighting Championship title, knows that he’s facing a world class wrestler and expects to fight off his back for the entire bout.
“This fight is going to start when I land on my back,” Lima said.
“I’m not stupid, I know how good his wrestling is, but I expect to land on my back once or twice, but I don’t think that’s going to matter. It’s not going to stop me from winning this fight. If I land a right hand on him, he’s going to go down.”
While Askren, despite complimenting Lima for his abilities, appeared more interested in putting down his last opponent Jay Hieron.
“Jay didn’t have the knockout power,” Askren said. “He doesn’t have that pop Douglas does, but he had significantly better wrestling. … I think his footwork was good. I don’t think Douglas has that great of footwork, but Douglas is probably a lot better on the ground than Jay was. Jay was terrible on the ground. Anytime I got him there, I knew he didn’t know what the hell he was doing. A different challenge, for sure, but better or worse I’m not sure.”
Askren and Hieron fought to a split decision last October with Askren defending his title for the first time. Some felt the decision should have gone the other way. Hieron has asked for an immediate title rematch but was turned down by Bellator, leaving the only venue for getting another title shot would be winning another tournament. Hieron turned down the chance to enter the season six tournament and is currently weighing his options.