Bellator 61 – A cautious Maiquel Falcao reaches middleweight tournament semi-finals, joined by Vyacheslav Vasilevsky, Brian Rogers and Bruno Santos
The Bellator 61 event went down earlier tonight in Bossier, Louisiana, with eight of the best middleweights currently plying their trade outside of the UFC taking to the cage in an all middleweight tournament main card including former star of the octagon, Brazilian knockout artist Maiquel Falcao. Check out how they got on on the other side…
The main event of the evening saw Falcao take on Norman Paraisy for a berth in the middleweight tournament semi-finals (as did all of the main card fights). Falcao was uncharacteristically cautious in his approach, taking the fight to the ground in the opening minutes before clinching up against the fence for long periods of time. The second round goes much the same way with Falcao taking control up against the fence as well as getting the better of the stand-up. Falcao ups the ante in the third and final round, putting Paraisy in a difficult position on the ground early on and during the midway part of the five minutes. Falcao gives up position looking for a submission but does a good job of limiting the amount of damage the Frenchman can dish out his way. A late stand-up saw a crazy exchange but ultimately Falcao did enough in each round for the win via unanimous decision.. In the co-main event of the evening Russian stand-out Vyacheslav Vasilevsky took Victor O’Donnell to task on route to a three round unanimous decision win. Vasilevsky was on the verge of stopping the fight on numerous occasions in the second and third round but just couldn’t do enough to force the referee to step in. The fight was very one-sided past the first frame and a good win on his debut.
The first fight of the main card and this seasons middleweight tournament saw Brian Rogers land a big flying knee to defeat highly touted Vitor Vianna via knockout in the very first round. Rogers had edged the stand-out throughout the round up until that point but really put an exclamation point on the fight with the finish. Bruno Santos defeated the oldest fighter in the middleweight tournament, Giva Santana via unanimous decision in a close three round affair. The first two rounds were very close, with two of the judges giving one round apiece to the two fighters. Santos took over in the final round, landing decent strikes as well as a takedown to close out the win.
On the preliminary card Trey Houston pulled off a first round arm-bar submission win over Jeremiah Riggs, while Derrick Krantz walked away also with a first round submission win, this time via brabo choke, over Eric Scallan. Jason Sampson defeated Jeremy Myers via rear-naked choke midway through the third and final round and in a preliminary card fight that took place after the main event of the evening
The full results from the card are as follows:
Main Card:
Maiquel Falcao defeats Norman Paraisy via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27).
Brian Rogers defeats Vitor Vianna via KO (flying knee) at 4:14 of round 1.
Vyacheslav Vasilevsky defeats Victor O’Donnell via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28).
Bruno Santos defeats Giva Santana via unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28).
Preliminary card:
Josh Quayhagen vs. Brent Taylor
Trey Houston defeats Jeremiah Riggs via submission (arm bar) at 3:30 of round 1
Derrick Krantz defeats Eric Scallan via submission (brabo choke) at 3:01 of round 1
Jason Sampson defeats Jeremy Myers via submission (rear naked choke) at 2:25 of round 3
By Michael Pepper. (Follow me on Twitter)
Why not tell us what you think about this story and get your thoughts featured in this week’s edition of MMABay Radio? Email Mailbag@mmabay.co.uk, start the subject with the word ‘RADIO MAILBAG’ and we’ll talk about our favourites on the next show.
