EFC39: the calm before the storm
IT’S WAR: GROENEWALD, VAN ZYL PREPARE FOR BATTLE
There’s no love lost among fighters at the weigh-in.
While tempers flared when the combatants for tonight’s EFC39 squared off at the weigh-in, the two mixed martial artists involved in the main event managed to remain calm.
But don’t let the placid natures of Brendon Groenewald and Andrew Van Zyl fool you – once the gates to the hexagon are closed it’s all about destruction.
For Groenewald tonight offers an opportunity to defend his heavyweight crown for the first time and he’ll do so in front of his home support in Cape Town. But Van Zyl has other plans.
“I like to bang and that’s what I’ll do,” the challenger – who weighed in at a mammoth 115.5kg – said at the weigh-in yesterday.
The main supporting bout sees former light-heavyweight champion Gideon Drotschie looking to gain some redemption after surrendering his title to Norman Wessels at EFC35 when he faces off against Tumelo Maputha.
Maputha is never involved in a dull fight and always asks questions of everybody.
The lightweight bout between Regis Muyambo and Don Madge provides the former to test his credentials as a fighter to watch against a former champion, while also splitting the opinion’s of Cape Town’s supporters firmly down the middle given that both hail from the Mother City.
There were fireworks when newcomers Champion Dalcha and Yannick Bahati squared off with security needed to separate the two after a tense face-off. The two will clash at middleweight.
The opening fight of the main card sees a clash of the bantamweights as Oumpie Sebeko takes on Irshaad Sayed.
Sayed has yet to lose, but that didn’t mean much to Sebeko, who is 2-1, as he showed little respect by slapping his opponent at the weigh-in.
Tennis