Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
Action-packed day of mixed martial arts championship
THE Mixed Martial Arts South Africa (MMASA) Amateur Championship kicked off in fine style at the AMMA Underground in Edenvale yesterday.
Fighters from across the country arrived in Gauteng to compete over three days – in an elimination-structured event – for spots in the South African teams set to participate in either the Youth IMMAF Championship (taking place in Turkey this July) or in the IMMAF World Championship taking place in Kazakhstan in November or December.
MMASA and Alpha Mixed Martial Arts (AMMA) put on an awesome show on day one which saw a total of 16 fights (Juniors and Seniors) take place.
Only three fights went the distance with the balance of the card leaving nothing to the judges with some fine TKOs and KOs.
RESULTS FROM DAY ONE.
Fight 1: The Western Cape’s Aneesha
Mayman beat Gauteng’s Saskia Jade Jantjes via ref’s stoppage in the second round.
Fight 2: KwaZulu-Natal’s Micheal Angelo Adriane succumbed to Gauteng’s Mathys du Randt’s rear-naked choke in the first round.
Fight 3: Gauteng’s Philani Shabalala got the TKO over Darren Revenscroft (Western Cape) in the second round.
Fight 4: Gauteng’s Mpumelelo Mngoma pulled off the beautiful Kimura choke forcing KwaZulu-Natal’s Sandile Luthi to tap.
Fight 5: KZN’s Sipho Mlaba got the win over the Western Cape’s Heinrich Jacobs via a split decision (30-27, 28-29, 29-28). Fight 6: Athenkosi Mongwe (Eastern Cape) tapped out to Jesse Schaper’s (Gauteng) rear-naked choke.
Fight 7: Gauteng’s Kyle Sham got the split decision over Tayyib Galdari from KZN. Fight 8: Kevin Pretorius (Eastern Cape) dropped the first KO of the night beating KZN’s Nasiphi Vellem.
Fight 9: Gauteng’s Allistar Kunene got the unanimous decision (27-30, 27-30, 27-30) over Shayan Parboo (Eastern Cape).
Fight 10: KZN’s Abdur Rahmaan pulled off an armbar beating Mpumalanga’s Luke Stander.
Fight 11: Peace Nguphane (Gauteng) earned a ref’s stoppage via TKO in the first round over his KZN opponent, Philani Mbuyazi.
Fight 12: One of the most craziest bouts in the history of South African MMA. After three rounds the judges had a tie, and this led to Adebayo Ojewole (KZN) losing to the Northern Cape’s Sarel du Plessis via unanimous decision following a fourth round.
Fight 13: Charl Adams (Eastern Cape) beat Mark Botha (KZN) via TKO due to strikes. Fight 14: Western Cape’s Lesley Jacquelin beat Alex Awolaja (Gauteng) via TKO due to strikes.
Fight 15: Khaya Ntombela (KZN) stole the show with a quick KO, 24 seconds into his bout with Zander Jansen van Rensburg (Gauteng).
The final fight of the day went to the Eastern Cape’s Tony Killian after he submitted Joubert Pienaar (Sedibeng) via a sneaky rear-naked choke in the second round.