Raoni
Barcelos and Khalid Taha
brought the heat for 15 full minutes at
UFC on ESPN 17.
The bantamweight competitors were rewarded for their efforts with
“Fight of the Night” and $50,000 apiece on Saturday at the UFC Apex
in Las Vegas. Barcelos set a tremendous pace throughout the bout
and appeared to be on the verge of putting his opponent away on a
few occasions, but Taha stayed in the fight and made it to the
final horn. Still, it was Barcelos who emerged with a well-deserved
unanimous decision triumph.
Elsewhere, Giga
Chikadze pocketed a $50,000 “Performance of the Night” award
for a quick finish of replacement foe James
Krause-Simmons in a featured featherweight matchup. After a
feeling-out process, Chikadze felled Krause-Simmons with a body
kick followed by a head kick. Standing-to-ground punches ended the
bout 3:51 into the first frame.
Finally, heavyweight submission artist Alexander
Romanov earned the evening’s other $50,000 “Performance of the
Night” check thanks to a tapout of Marcos
Rogerio de Lima in a preliminary affair. Romanov walked through
a barrage of low kicks and power punches from his Brazilian
opponent to end the contest with a rarely-seen forearm choke 4:48
into the first round.