This Week's MMA

By Fight Fans

Cruz v Faber II

Event starts at 23:00 GMT 02/07/11

Cruz v Faber

I wasn't impressed with Faber in his last fight against Eddie Wineland. He was slow to start, definitely lost the first, and then only just did enough to win rounds two and three.

Unfortunately I do not know much about Cruz which makes this a difficult pick. I am leaning towards Cruz slightly. The bookies look to have it right at 1.8.

Since losing to Faber in 2007, Cruz has had an impressive 7 fight win streak, beating top opponents like Benavidez, Bowles, Jorgensen. Jorgensen and Bowles in particular looked impressive in their last outings.

Silva v Leben

Silva has been inactive for over a year and this worries me. I would be backing him normally. Leben lost to Bisping; Bisping lost to Silva. Both these fights were stand-ups so we would normally be able to compare.

Ortiz v Bader

Bader’s only loss is to Jon Jones – the champion. Jones made Bader look ordinary, and then Jones went on to destroy Rua and take his belt off him. Let’s ignore the Jones fight for Bader, he has looked very impressive in all of his other bouts.

Ortiz: Lost his last five and has been out for almost a year.

Condit v Dong Hyun Kim

Condit: Very impressive record. His only losses are to Jake Shields and Martin Kampmann – both are classy fighters. His last three fights: Hardy, MacDonald, Ellenberger. Despite him coming from behind to get a stoppage against MacDonald; these are still 3 wins against 3 top level opponents.

Dong Hyun Kim: Undefeated. Wins against Amir Sadollah and Matt Brown – top level opponents.

This fight is difficult to call.

Siver v Wiman

Siver has all the momentum moving into this fight with his win against George Sotiropoulos. We saw in this fight that his takedown defence had vastly improved.

Wiman: Good hands and BJJ. His hands weren’t good enough to knock Sam Stout out though. His last few opponents have been at a lower level to Siver’s opponents. These two last points make me lean towards Siver.

Guillard v Roller

With Roller being one of the WEC boys, I know little about him. His record looks good. Guillard has had mixed results and performances in his long MMA career. He is on a 4 fight win streak but I’m still leaning towards Roller’s wrestling being the deciding factor in this bout.

Sotiropoulos v Dos Anjos

Dos Anjos has been outwrestled and submitted on too many occasions now. I can’t see him having improved this defence enough to stop the same line of threat coming from Sotiropoulos.

Bowles v Mizugaki

Faber submitted Mizugaki easily; saying that, Faber can submit almost anyone easily. Bowles poses a major threat with his submittals and he looked amazingly well-rounded in his UFC debut.

Tavares v Simpson

No comment

Njokuani v Winner

Njokuani looked impressive against top opponent Edson Barboza last time out. Winner has looked very average so far in his UFC career.

Picks:

Cruz; 2 pts @ 1.8 Boylesports

Siver; 3 pts @ 1.8 (StanJames)

Njokuani 3 pts @ 1.73 (SkyBet)

Cruz, Bader, Siver, Roller, Sotiropoulos, Bowles, Njokuani; accy 1 pt @ 34.3 (Sportingbet)

 Fight Fans