Duncan sights are on Sin City’s headliners

AS anniversary presents go, being asked to step into a cage and face a man with a hammer of a right hand has got to be pretty far down the list.

However, Gloucester middleweight Christian Leroy Duncan, who signed with the UFC last March, cannot wait to cap a promising first 12 months when he faces Claudio Ribeiro in Las Vegas tonight.

After a mixed start to his octagon career, ‘CLD’ displayed the free-flowing striking that made him a Cage Warriors stand-out in his TKO win over Denis Tiuliulin last November.

Duncan (inset) said: “It has been an eventful 12 months but I have enjoyed every moment. My first fight I won by TKO but it wasn’t the TKO I would have liked to have got, with the knee injury (to Dusko Todorovic).

“The second fight (against Armen Petrosyan) a lot of lessons were learned outside the cage and the fight didn’t end up going my way.

“The third fight I corrected things outside and I was able to perform how I have done in my past fights. Here we are now ready to continue the journey.”

Ribeiro is the man standing in Duncan’s way, the Brazilian boasting an impressive seven first-round finishes on his record.

Duncan, who is 9-1, added: “When he gets his momentum, he is definitely a big threat.

“It is more about stopping him getting that momentum and playing his own game against him.”

This will be Duncan’s third straight fight at the UFC’s Apex facility, an intimate venue away from the hustle and bustle of the big casinos. However, the Brit is confident he will soon be joining Sin City’s headliners in the centre of the Strip.

He said: “I think that will come – and I think that will come very soon.”