Main event UFC 276
The fight will take place on August 21 in Salt Lake City (Utah, USA) at the Vivint Arena and will become the main event of the UFC 276 PPV tournament. The estimated start of the fight is 07:00 Kyiv time. The fight will be broadcast live on Setanta Sports.
UFC welterweight champion Kamaru Usman (20-1) will put the title on the line for the sixth time to rematch Leon Edwards (19-3, 1 NC).
The two faced each other in a cage on the UFC on Fox 17 preliminary card in December 2015. Usman then won by unanimous decision. That fight went unnoticed by the public, although Usman was already considered a promising prospect at that time, which could not be said about Edwards. Seven years ago, the idea that they would again enter the cage for the UFC title seemed crazy. But since then, a lot of water has flowed under the bridge, and each of the fighters has achieved incredible growth.
Usman’s championship run is known to all MMA fans. After finishing with Demian Maia and Rafael dos Anjos, in March 2019, the Nigerian Nightmare declassified Tyron Woodley and became the new UFC welterweight champion. Since then, Usman has made five defenses despite only fighting three opponents.
Usman finished with shots from Gilbert Burns, Jorge Masvidal and Colby Covington, with the latter two also won on scorecards. Usman last fought in November at UFC 268, going five rounds with Covington, the champion’s third defense in 2021. Not surprisingly, Kamaru Usman was almost unanimously voted “Fighter of the Year 2021” by a host of publications.
For Edwards, the fight against Usman was the second in the UFC, just like for Kamaru. And the British “Rocky” no longer lost in the octagon. After losing, he spent ten fights, failing, however, to win one. During his massive winning streak, he defeated Vicente Luque, Donald Cerrone, Gunnar Nelson, Rafael dos Anjos and Nate Diaz by unanimous decision last June at UFC 263 in his last fight so far. And it was the third fight in the last three years in which Edwards fought all five rounds. In his previous fight three months before, Edwards fought Belal Muhammad, but at the start of the second round, Leon hit his opponent with a finger in the eye, he could not continue, and the fight was declared invalid.
The fight against Diaz did not immediately open the door for a title shot for Edwards. In December at UFC 269, Leon was scheduled to fight Jorge Masvidal, but Gamebred pulled out due to injury, and Edwards was never found another opponent. In essence, Edwards didn’t beat top contenders to earn a championship fight, in many ways, he got a title shot because Usman cleared the division.
From a stylistic point of view, Kamaru Usman is a real nightmare for a challenger. Edwards has had great success in wrestling, but Usman is still the strongest wrestler in the division and the best takedown master. It has never been put on its back yet, and it tends to take down even the toughest opponents with ease.
Edwards is also a good and technical striker, but now, unlike in their first fight, Usman is no longer a layman on the stand. Now he has a hard jab and powerful two-handed strikes, and although Usman can be pulled into the cockpit, his chin looks like reinforced concrete.
It is also worth remembering that Rocky has been extremely inactive in recent years – since July 2019 he has fought only twice, and one of these fights lasted a little longer than one round. Usman, on the other hand, fought five times in the same period of time and went through 25 minutes of the fight with Covington 9 months ago.
Overall, Edwards is probably strong enough not to be finished by Usman, but it’s hard to imagine he can do enough to deserve the win. It will be difficult for Edwards to even win at least one round against the P4P king.
Usman win on points
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