Super Fight League 2 – Review – Still Not Convinced

Super Fight League 2 – Review – Still Not Convinced

Published on April 8, 2012 by The Editor in Super Fight League

Super Fight League Something’s Missing

Unlike many I am very into the idea of the Super Fight League, Indeed I was telling everybody via this site that it would be the best Asian event of the weekend.

Well, honestly I never watched any of the others, sorry, just not available to me. However SFL are streaming Free and Live on YouTube which is a super smart idea to build an audience.

They, then must have been both pleased and upset with the numbers who viewed on-line. Pleased because they pulled in about 40% more viewers than the recent ONE FC 3 War of the Lions card. Upset because that still amounted to less than 4000 people worldwide.

And the card that I touted as the best of the weekend was at times disappointing.

Unlike many I totally understand the need to have local fighters prominently in the show and the idea of mixing them in with much better known international names on paper looked to be a very good move.

So, what went wrong?

Well, these higher profile foreigners are supposed to put on an exciting show to drag the crowd in, the local crowd especially needs to see some real exciting bouts to get them interested into, what is after all a new sport to most of the indian public.

Sadly the first bout Paul Kelly (ex UFC) and Ryan Healy (ex WEC and Strikeforce)  failed to live up to expectation as Paul Kelly spectacularly disappointed everybody with his attempts to impose himself on the American Healy. It was by any measure a fairly dull affair and Healy won a deserved decision, without ever looking to be in trouble. If you saw the Ben Askran fight at Bellator this week, well, it was like that only with much less skill on display.

The second bout featured a change from that talked about on my pre-fight article as Pierre Daguzan (France) stepped into fill a gap left by Ishan Abeyrathna against Chaitanya Gavali.

Gavali was a winner at SFL 1 and it has to be said firstly that he looked a lot better in this fight than in that last one, but, the simple fact was neither he or the Frenchman looked like they would last a round against any half decent practitioner of BJJ. They fought hard enough and Gavali looked a lot more determined to put on a show this time, however his fitness was suspect and as he tired Dagazan didn’t and going into round 3, they were a round a piece on my card but there was only ever going to be one winner. Dagazan.  It was a very low-level fight but necessary to blood fighters like Gavali, who after all is what this event is about, without Indian fighters the Super Fight League will fail.

Next up was Kandare Vs Ismael – Kandare won this without too much trouble via TKO.

Next up was probably the most anticipated fight amongst real MMA fans Alexander Shlemenko Vs Ikuisa Minowa.

Minowa man is a massive name in J MMA and Shlemenko is a present day Bellator fighter. Sadly all that can be said is that once again a Japanese fighter failed when coming up against a top quality warrior. And, although not as mystifying as Bob ‘Tap’ Sapp, you have to wonder how a blow to the head could lead to Minowa basically giving up and acting as though he had either broken ribs or a damaged arm or leg, he didn’t seem to know what to blame it on but it was very clear that although the ref may not have wanted to stop the fight, Minowa did not wish to continue.

What should have been the fight of the night was sadly just an example of a big gulf in class. The highlight of the night was when Shlemenko was interviewed after the fight and all he said was ‘Hector I Kill You” clearly a reference to Hector Lombard who beat Shlemenko via a decision back in October 2010 – his last loss. Oh yes, let’s get that one on!

Anup Kumar appeared next against Dilanga Rathnaveera – Kumar is a bright spot for Indian MMA he appeared to have benefitted from some recent top quality training and he dispatched Rathnaveera with a rear naked choke in round 2.

Ricky Sanhi defeated Senanayake with punches in the latter stages of round 1.

Then we had a ladies fight, unlike the last event this was not the fight of the night. As the Brit Cheire Buck failed to impress against the American, Collen Schneider  who bossed the fight finally getting a stoppage midway through round two.

Main Event:

Sadly a major disappointment as the veteran Brit, Grove was smashed inside of 34 seconds by American Todd Duffee.

Oh how the SFL must be hoping for a decent main event fight!

So what did we learn from SFL 2.

Well, the fighters still did not make use of the walk-in opportunity afforded by the nice ramp to the cage, please can we have some showmen, I thought this was Sportatainment, it might be time to dust off those Mayhem Miller or King Mo Lawal’s Pride style walk in’s, let’s make it a real Bollywood show.

SFL need some more music, sure it’s a good theme, maybe we could open and close the show with it but PLEASE get something else for use throughout the show, it really does get on my tits oh and while you are at it, please only one page on your website, or when i turn the sound off please keep it off!

Can we please ban little red pants, Minowan man was not a pleasant sight (that goes for all MMA events), oh and while we are banning things, ban those bloody horns as well. If the crowd really are enjoying themselves let them make some noise.

Can we please tell the MC the show isn’t about him, my what an annoying sob he is.

If you are going to get Phil Baroni into the cage don’t ask him to interview fighters who cannot or will not speak English, I felt sorry for him as he looked like a spare part standing there while the MC did his job in Indian and did not tell us what the hell was said.

The commentary team do a good job and are a real positive for this organisation.

Is that cage super big or does it just look that way on TV? Because I hardly saw any work against the cage.

I still believe in Super Fight league, it just needs to get some real quality fights on board. They tried this time but sadly the fighters let them down and if they can sort out the few presentation issues it could still be a major success.

For now though ONE FC have nothing to worry about, SFL may have had more You Tube viewers, but ONE FC had genuinely passionate fans live at the show making a grand noise and real good quality fights.