The possibility of a repeat remains in play for defending
Professional Fighters League lightweight champion Olivier
Aubin-Mercier.
Aubin-Mercier waylaid Anthony
Romero with a beautiful knee strike in the third round of their
PFL 6 headliner on Friday at Overtime Elite Arena in Atlanta,
where the Tristar Gym standout clinched his spot in the postseason
in style. Blindsided by the fight-ending blow, Romero (12-2, 1-1
PFL) checked out 28 seconds into Round 3.
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The 34-year-old Aubin-Mercier (19-5, 8-0 PFL) was calculated and
efficient, and a brief brush with adversity—Romero buckled his
knees with a first-round front kick—did nothing to knock him off
his mark. He routinely cut off the cage against his fellow
Canadian, forced him onto the back foot and scored with check right
hooks and slicing straight lefts. No one saw the finish coming,
least of all Romero.
Aubin-Mercier backed him to the fence, caught him ducking and
connected with a perfectly timed knee to the head.
Meanwhile, Xtreme Couture’s Sadibou Sy
wrecked Shane
Mitchell with
a sensational spinning wheel kick in the third round of their
welterweight co-main event. Sy (15-6-2, 9-4-2 UFC),
the PFL’s defending champion at 170 pounds, sealed the deal 1:35
into Round 3 and secured another playoff berth while he was at
it.
Outside of a multi-punch volley in the first round, Mitchell (13-6,
0-2 PFL) was ineffective. Sy spent two-plus rounds more or less
toying with his prey, as he piled up points with a sneaky jab and
brutal kicks to the body and legs. Early in Round 3, he cut loose
with the wheel kick, his heel striking Mitchell directly on the
jaw. His circuits scrambled, the Aussie collapsed to the canvas and
covered up to avoid any further punishment. By that time, a
celebratory Sy had already turned his back and raised his arms in
triumph.
The 36-year-old Sy now finds himself on a six-fight winning
streak.
Elsewhere, American Top Team’s Magomed
Magomedkerimov dispatched David
Zawada with
punches in the first round of their featured attraction at 170
pounds. Magomedkerimov (32-6, 14-1 PFL) brought it to
an emphatic close 3:54 into Round 1, as he clinched the No. 1 seed
in the welterweight playoffs and did so with authority.
Zawada (18-9, 0-2 PFL) enjoyed some fleeting success with low leg
kicks but failed to maintain a safe distance between himself and
his lethal Russian counterpart. Magomedkerimov stepped into a
jarring right hand, pushed the dazed UFD Gym product to the canvas
and smashed him with standing-to-ground punches until referee Bryan
Miner had seen enough.
Magomedkerimov, 33, has rattled off four straight wins, three of
them finishes.
Further down the card, former Eagle Fighting Championship
titleholder Magomed
Umalatov kept his perfect professional record intact with a
unanimous decision over the previously unbeaten Nayib Lopez
in their three-round welterweight attraction. Umalatov (14-0, 5-0
PFL) swept the scorecards with 30-27, 30-27 and 29-27 marks from
the judges, as he qualified for the PFL playoffs at 170 pounds.
The start could not have gone worse for Lopez (16-1, 1-1 PFL).
Umalatov swarmed him with multi-faceted skills and nearly finished
it on more than one occasion, first with an arm-triangle choke and
later with a hellacious volley of punches on the ground and on the
feet. Lopez somehow survived, but he was clearly compromised for
the remainder of the match. The frenetic pace cost Umalatov, as
well. Visibly fatigued from all the offensive output, he took a
more measured approach in the second and third rounds, where he
picked his spots in the standup and executed late takedowns to sew
up another victory.
Finally, Clay
Collard turned away two-time Cage Warriors Fighting
Championship titleholder Steven Ray
with
punches in the second round of their lightweight
feature. Collard (23-10, 5-2 PFL) drew the curtain
1:04 into Round 2, nailing down a playoff berth at 155 pounds in
the process.
Ray (25-13, 2-4 PFL) kept the Utah native guessing for much of the
first round, where he executed two takedowns, advanced to the back
and even threatened a Suloev stretch at one point. Those efforts
failed to produce the desired results. Collard sat down the Scot
with a surgical straight right early in Round 2, forced him to the
butt scoot position and whipped a series of kicks into his legs. He
eventually allowed Ray to stand, then tore into him with vicious
body-head punches along the fence. The barrage drove him to the
canvas, where Collard unleashed his ground-and-pound and prompted
the stoppage.
The 30-year-old Collard has won nine of his past 12 bouts.
In other action, Carlos
Leal Miranda (19-4, 5-1 PFL) cut down Dilano
Taylor (10-5, 3-4 PFL) with
punches 73 seconds into the second round of their featured
170-pound prelim, booking his spot in the welterweight
playoffs; Natan
Schulte (25-5-1, 14-2-1 PFL) took a unanimous decision from
Raush
Manfio (17-5, 6-2 PFL) in a three-round battle at 155 pounds,
drawing 30-27, 30-27 and 29-28 marks from the judges to clinch a
spot in the lightweight playoffs; Bruno
Miranda (16-3, 3-0 PFL) eked out a split decision—28-29, 29-28,
29-28—over Alex
Martinez (10-5, 3-5 PFL) in a three-round lightweight encounter
and reserved a postseason berth at 155 pounds; Shane
Burgos (16-4, 1-1 PFL) was awarded a unanimous decision over
Yamato
Nishikawa (21-5-6, 0-2 PFL) but failed to qualify for the
postseason in a three-round lightweight tussle, earning 30-26
scores from all three members of the cageside judiciary; Solomon
Renfro (11-3, 1-0 PFL) wiped out Jarrah
Al-Silawi (18-6, 2-3 PFL) with
punches 1:44 into the second round of their welterweight
clash; Brahyan
Zurcher (6-0, 4-0 PFL) took out Mike
Bardsley (2-1, 0-1 PFL) with
punches 4:45 into the second round of their featherweight
tilt; and Abdullah
Al-Qahtani (6-1, 1-0 PFL) dismissed Lamar Brown
(4-2, 0-1 PFL) with
a rear-naked choke 1:35 into the first round of their featherweight
affair.