Hey guys, not a thread for the Melbourne Fight Night card yet so figured I'd post this here in the meantime. Got a fair bit of free time this week so going to try and get as many breakdowns out as I can for this card, started watching fights this morning and going to try cover every fight (hopefully). Really had good success in the past when I've managed to really research the fights and break the down, even just for myself to put my thoughts into word helps a lot. If anyone has any particular ones they'd like done I'll try my best.
Marlon Vera vs. Guangyou Ning
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Marlon Vera represented Team Werdum on The Ultimate Fighter: Latin America where he won his quarter final fight via upkick KO against Enrique Briones. Unfortunately due to a skin infection he was forced out of the semi final and the tournament.
Vera dropped his debut against Marco Beltran where he was outworked with good top control and ground and pound but managed to attempt a few submissions along the way. Since then he has beaten Salazar via triangle-armbar combination and subsequently lost a unanimous decision to Davey Grant. Formerly training with Jackson-Wink MMA, Vera is now training with Team Oyama with the likes of Ian McCall and Josh Sampo, with regular training at 10th Planet Jiu Jitsu.
Vera is a work in progress on the feet but does have some dangerous knees, albeit he lacks finesse. Vera's Jiu Jitsu is his clear strength; incredibly active on top and bottom on the the mat, constantly hunting for submissions and sweeps. However, Vera suffers from the classic case of being a great Jiu Jitsu player without the good wrestling to utilise it fully. Until Vera either develops his standup and or wrestling he will never be a contender, however switching camps shows he is clearly looking learn and change up training methods, only time will show how that works out.
Guangyou Ning is also a former Ultimate Fighter cast member, where to match his nickname "Smasher" he smashed his way through the tournament with 2 KO victories before winning the eventual tournament finale where he beat Yang Jianping via Unanimous Decision.
Ning then went on to TKO Royston Wee in his next fight who wilted under the pressure on Ning's top control before succumbing to a head kick and barrage of heavy strikes to finish the fight. His next match up was against Marco Beltran where despite some early success he lost a very uneventful, almost sparring session like fight. He has since been out for close to a year and in that time he has changed camps from Tiger Muay Thai to the Asian Integrated Combat Training Institute in Beijing, of which I know nothing about, so don't think it would be fair to judge how this could affect his training.
Ning's game centres around throwing heavy strikes on the feet mixed in with powerful takedowns (aided by his fire hydrant build), crushing top control and bursts of big ground and pound. He has a solid Greco-Roman wrestling base which often allows him to dictate where he wants the fight to take place and I really feel that will be the key in this bout.
Ning should really be able to decide where he wants this fight to take place, I'd imagine his initial game plan with be to throw big shots on the feet and try and take out Vera this way. However if he isn't having much success he will be able to score takedowns against Vera. Vera will struggle to take down Ning so it's hard to see how he wins this; my only concern is if Ning does take Vera down and gets too comfortable in guard he is in a lot of danger due to Vera's incredibly active guard. Providing Ning sticks to a strict game plan and doesn't have a brainfart he should be able to take a decision in what will likely be a very hard fought contest.
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