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The Bellator light heavyweight title is up for grabs as champion Emanuel Newton will look to test out his talents against surging contender Liam McGeary. Many other Brits join the card, including Paul Daley and Linton Vassell. There’s also something of an oddity fight, as ‘King’ Mo Lawal jumps up to heavyweight to take on Cheick Kongo.

What: Bellator 134: Newton vs. McGeary

Where: Mohegan Sun Arena, Uncasville, CT

When: Friday, the preliminary card starts at 8 p.m. ET on Spike.com/MMA Fighting. The five-fight main card starts on Spike TV at 9 p.m. ET.

Emanuel Newton vs. Liam McGeary

I really just don’t know about this one. Newton could very likely get lit up if the fight stays on the feet for a prolonged period of time. McGeary has a stinging jab, excellent reactive knees, great power and killer finishing instincts. The problem is the ground, but perhaps for both fighters. McGeary lacks a lot of necessary skills to defend takedowns or scrambles, but is willing to take risks on the ground. The question is whether Newton can and will take advantage of them. It’s just hard to say with any certainty. I’m going to say yes because I do believe Newton has the takedowns, passing and positional control to get it done, but if he’s not bringing his A-game, it’s anyone’s fight.

Pick: Newton

Paul Daley vs. Andre Santos

There’s probably not much need to over think this one. Daley’s going to sprawl and brawl enough to eventually find an opening and bang Santos out. With which particular weapon or how early, I can’t say. The Brazilian is capable of dragging the fight out if needed, I just question his ability to put much offense together. I don’t have those concerns for Daley.

Pick: Daley

Cheick Kongo vs. Muhammed Lawal

Lawal probably has little interest in trying to strike on the outside with Kongo. This one is going to be fought in the clinch or on the ground. The key for me will be what kind of takedown Lawal attempts and how their strength matches up. Kongo is very adept at stopping lots of varieties of double and knee picks. He’s also good about pummeling for inside control in the clinch. He’s not so great with defending single leg attempts. Lawal could potentially have some success there. Ultimately, though, I wonder if Kongo’s too big and too defensively sound for Lawal to do damage in control positions, something that cost him the Rampage Jackson fight. Against an opponent this size, I suspect he is.

Pick: Kongo

Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou vs. Linton Vassell

Vassell isn’t necessarily the total package, but he might be one step down from that. He’s a great athlete with pretty respectable skills in virtually every department of MMA. He’s probably the best at ground and pound while advancing position on the ground, but whatever the case, it’s not clear where he’s weaker than Sokoudjou anywhere in the fight. I look for Vassell to score from the clinch and finish off a wounded Sokoudjou from there.

Pick: Vassell

Brennan Ward vs. Curtis Millender

I’m tempted to pick Ward for a couple of reasons. His ferocity has brought him good fortune a lot in his career, plus he’s at welterweight now. That said, Millender doesn’t have much of a name, but he’s a legit prospect. With a background in wrestling, he has the chops there to at least keep himself in the fight opposite Ward, who also has wrestling in his arsenal. More importantly, Millender is tall and uses his long striking skills very well. He fights tall. He’s got solid defense, rangy body kicks and tremendous KO power in his hands. I think we’re looking at an upset here.

Pick: Millender

Charmaine Tweet had her chance to alter the tide of women’s MMA in 2011.

In Tweet’s pro MMA debut, she took on a highly touted rookie fighter named Ronda Rousey in a regional Canadian promotion called Hard Knocks Fighting Championship. Rousey was already in negotiations with Strikeforce at the time and trying to get out of the bout agreement with Tweet to sign with the organization. Tweet would have none of it.

“What if I beat her?” Tweet said. “What would have come of her Strikeforce contract then?”

Rousey ended up finishing Tweet via armbar in the first round and the rest is history. Rousey is now the UFC women’s bantamweight champion and the biggest star in the history of women’s MMA.

The largest potential fight for Rousey is against Cris “Cyborg” Justino, who just so happens to be Tweet’s opponent in the main event of Invicta FC 11 on Friday night in Los Angeles. Justino, the Invicta women’s featherweight champion, is already in talks with the UFC about an eventual fight with Rousey. And Tweet doesn’t plan on letting history repeat itself.

“I just want to be the person who throws the wrench into those plans,” Tweet said. “I’ve been in this position before. When I look back on it before, I wasn’t ready to be in that position.”

Tweet (6-4) feels somewhat slighted that “Cyborg” is already in negotiations with the UFC, since that is nearly a concession by all parties that Justino will beat her. Tweet is just dying to play the spoiler role that eluded her four years ago against Rousey.

“I’d like to think I’m an obstacle in that road,” Tweet said. “It almost feels like they’re completely overlooking that obstacle, which is fine. That’s cool. Overlook me. You’re gonna be in for a surprise.”

This will be Tweet’s 25^th career fight, taking into account Muay Thai bouts and amateur MMA competitions. She won’t be one to get lost in the moment. As Invicta FC president Shannon Knapp puts it, it’s also a win-win for Tweet.

“Charmaine is very dangerous if taken lightly,” Knapp said. “This is a very high-profile fight. It’s a big fight. [UFC president] Dana [White] is gonna be there. All eyes are gonna be on this. She has nothing to lose. When you have that adrenaline, when you have someone going in there with absolutely nothing to lose, I think you’re always in danger.”

Tweet, 37, did admit to being emotional when she got offered the bout. The veteran had to pull out of a potential fight with Faith Van Duin in December when a brain scan came back inconclusive. She fully expected to be getting Van Duin in her return fight once cleared by doctors. Instead, Knapp and Invicta matchmaker Julie Kedzie put a title fight with “Cyborg” on the table.

“When I first got the call, I’ll admit I was nervous,” Tweet said. “I was like, ‘Holy crap, what did I just step into here?’ Now, we’ve watched more tape. We’ve broken it down. We’ve kind of in my camp taken away the mystique of ‘The Cyborg.'”

Tweet has taken measures to minimize what this fight means, especially the aura of Justino, who is one of the best and most intimidating women’s fighters on the planet. One of the rules of her training camp up in Saskatchewan was that the word “Cyborg” was not to be uttered.

“Her name is Cris and she’s just a human being like me, standing across the cage from me and she has something I want,” Tweet said. “We’ve really humanized her and I’m in a much calmer headspace right now. Probably one of the calmest I’ve been in ever.”

All that adds up to confidence heading into this fight at Shrine Auditorium in Downtown Los Angeles. Tweet is completely focused on this fight. For “Cyborg,” it might be a stepping-stone, but for Tweet it’s the biggest bout of her career.

“I don’t know, how focused can you be when the UFC is dangling that carrot right there in front of you?” Tweet said. “Good for you. Keep doing that. I’m in the gym training.”

One of the joys of speaking to Emanuel Newton is that pretty soon you feel like Carl Sagan in a sweat lodge. All you’ve got to do is ask a fairly straightforward question and then get the hell out of the way.

In this case, the question was: Why did it take so long for people to notice you?

“I understand things on a different level,” Bellator’s light heavyweight champion says. “What I believe — and what I see and know, as it is proven — there’s a grid that travels across the earth. That’s how we have cell phone connections. How can I speak to you on Skype all the way on the other side of the world? It’s the grid that runs across the earth.

“The same thing happens when you connect with people. So the more Instagram followers you have, the more Twitter followers you have, the more people you’re connected to. So I believe that it is the universe that made me slow to grow, that made me slow to be noticed. Because I wasn’t ready for it yet. I wasn’t prepared for it yet, because they probably would have just tore me down and beat me up and left me broken. So now I’m prepared, so now I’m ready as it comes as it should. As it’s supposed to. It is what it is, you know?”

That kind of answer can be called a lot of things, but cliché isn’t one of them. Newton, who will attempt to defend his 205-pound title against Liam McGeary on Friday night at Bellator 134: The British Invasion, is a man who investigates his own inner-workings. If he feels he’s in collusion with the very directors of the universe, he’ll damn well tell you so. It makes for interviews that careen off into the cosmos without so much as a second thought.

In other words: Fantastic.

The 31-year old fights a little like he talks, too. It’s a lot of confounding spinny stuff, backfists from divination. He’s proven that he’s somewhat of a master at adapting to his opponent in the cage, as he did with Joey Beltran in September. In that one, he spun a couple of times before something dawned on him. He needed to become a counter striker in this instance, and so he “baited” Beltran into his orbit one last time. Then Newton, gauging his aggression, dropped Beltran with a spinning backfist.

“I was really having a lot of head chatter that night,” he says. “I had a lot of things going through my mind.” Later on he says, “I always need to tap into an energy that helps me to adapt to my opponents.”

This all started for the broader public when he tapped into some raw energy against Muhammed Lawal during the Season 8 light heavyweight tournament. Same thing – a spinning backfist that put Lawal on the dream flow.

“The crazy thing is now from what I’m starting to see of myself in training versus what I see in myself in fighting, I think the majority of it’s instinct,” he says. “Granted, I know how to throw all these things and I practice them, but sometimes I’m in the gym and I’ll be like, man, I throw so much more in a fight…so much weird sh*t in a fight. But I just think at that time my mind goes into a different mode. It’s like, it’s fight time, let’s pull all the tricks out of the basket. And I adapt to my opponents. I adapt to what they do, and I always find a chink in the armor.”

Against McGeary he’ll be fighting a 6-foot-6 Briton who has finished all nine of his profession fights. Imposing? Not when you’re Newton, who sees advantages in being shorter and stockier.

“I prefer to fight taller guys,” he says. “I prefer to fight the bigger guys, because they’re usually not stronger than me and usually they don’t move as well as I do. So, bigger guys are better for me, taller guys are better, and I can get a hold of Liam and have a lot more real estate to work with.”

In Newton’s last fight, at Bellator 130, Newton choked out Linton Vassell, who stands 6-foot-4 and carries and 82-inch wingspan.

“When I can learn his range, and where to stay away from the end of his power, then it’ll be easier for me to spin away and get on the inside,” Newton says. “And then once on the inside, he’s not going to have as much, because his arms are so long. It’s going to be harder for him to hit me, harder for him to pummel with me. If anything, I think fighting a longer guy has its perks to it, too, especially with my style.”

The year 2009 was a pocket of turbulent energy for Newton, who lost all three fights he participated in that year. Since that time, though, he’s gone 13-1, with seven wins in a row in Bellator.

What happened…and what changed?

“Just living in the flesh, man,” he says. “Living in fear and worry, and getting sick and overtraining, and doing what this person wants me to do, and that person wants me to do, instead of paying attention to my inner-voice, paying attention to myself. And then my daughter was in my mindset. When she was born I think I was given a new energy and a spark. And ever since she’s been with us, since she’s been talking and walking, I haven’t lost. So I believe she’s been a catalyst to catapult me to where I am now.”

Get a good look at Newton as he fights at the Mohegan Sun Friday night. It’s some unorthodox stuff he does, but here’s another thing — “The Hardcore Kid” says he’ll retire at 33 years old “to do other stuff.” Thirty-three was the age that Christ and John Belushi died, but for Newton it’ll be the next chapter in his career.

Already he’s appearing in movies. He has a speaking roll in a film called The Green Ghost, where he and UFC heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez play “martial arts masters.” His training partner and noteworthy Hollywood stuntman Arnold Chon set that up. And Newton likes to just let things happen in the way they are going to happen, whether it is movies or some other avenue.

He doesn’t like to make too many plans.

“Plans always fail, man, promises are always broken,” he says. “I just go with the flow and follow my light and stay patient and things come to me as it’s supposed to.”

So there’s no sense predicting how his fight with McGeary is going to down, right? Wrong again, bubba. It’s Newton himself that’s forever unpredictable.

“Either a knockout or a submission or a TKO,” he says. “I don’t say which round it’s going to be or how long it’s going to be, I just say I’m going to finish him.