Glory Heavyweight Grand Prix [09-03] Results

[K1power]

As if 137kg wasn't bad enough for a guy with his height/build.

[K1power]

Anyway, we're live people.

My pizza took a while to arrive, so I'm a bit late .

Enjoy the card everybody!

[K1power]

I missed the first round of Levi/Uku and Videoland doesn't have a rewind option, but the bits they replayed looked crazy.

[kbfan]

Very impressed with Bahram Rajabzadeh, he needs to put on a few more kg's of muscle and he can be a real danger to any HW. He will lose some speed but he seems to have more than enough, he needs a bit more power to put people down. Very nice fight!!

[kbfan]

Embarrassing fight, neither of these 2 guys should be anywhere near such a tournament.
Benny is done imo, he should retire.

[vampiro]

I love Bahram Rajabzadeh. That is all.

[kbfan]

So Rico in the final in case anyone had any doubts hopefully he will have somewhat of a challenging fight there at least

[vampiro]

Don't care about the result tbh. I was a Bahram believer. I am proud of him. In another age, he would be a popular underdog in Japan.

[Shadess]

WTF. JBS came into the ring and tried to kick Rico. What a moron.
Interesting to see if he gets a Glory ban.

[K1power]

Results
Heavyweight Grand Prix
Rico Verhoeven defeats Levi Rigters by TKO R2
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Rico Verhoeven defeats Nabil Khachab by Unanimous Decision
Levi Rigters defeats Bahram Rajabzadeh by Unanimous Decision
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Rico Verhoeven defeats Sofian Laïdouni by Unanimous Decision
Nabil Khachab defeats Benjamin Adegbuyi by Unanimous Decision
Bahram Rajabzadeh defeats Tariq Osaro by Unanimous Decision
Levi Rigters defeats Uku Jürjendal by KO R2

Tournament Reserve Fight
Cihad Kepenek defeats Michał Bławdziewicz by TKO R2 (two knockdowns)

Light Heavyweight Championship Bout
Tarik Khbabez defeats Donegi Abena by Split Decision

Lightweight Championship Bout
Tyjani Beztati defeats Enriko Kehl by Unanimous Decision

Middleweight Featured Fight
Iliass Hammouche defeats Ivan Galaz by Unanimous Decision

[K1power]

My thoughts:

Overall I liked this event, but have a lot of mixed feelings.
Some parts surpassed my expectations, some parts confirmed my fears.

While IMHO the tournament does not compare to any of the K-1 Grand Prix tournaments, bracket A and the final had moments that definitely remind me of the classic tournaments.

I also gotta cut Glory some slack, because despite making numerous mistakes leading up to this they had to start somewhere and there is potential to improve things with the next tournaments. If tournaments remain a thing, that is.

On to the specifics.

The Good
+ With the exception of Khachab/Rico, I actually liked all fights - to some extent.
+ The event ending on a strong note.
+ The tournament final! I was surprised Rigters made it to the second round, then he threw that backfist that almost finished Rico. Rico then dug deep, recovered and went back to finish Levi. Case in point of why tournaments are essential in Kickboxing.
+ Abena/Khbabez. Yes, there was a lot of drama both before and during the fight and parts of it were sloppy, but man this was a true war of attrition and everything thrown was with bad intentions. Also happy both fighters were able to shake hands and show each other respect after all was said and done.
+ Abena's entrance.
+ Galaz/Hammouche: The matchup Glory kept fighting for lol. It was pretty decent! Should have been a prelim though. Poor Galaz thinking he won the fight at the end lol.
+ Rigters/Rajabzadeh: The fight. Both fighters had to dig deep in this one and they did.
+ While I was hoping for a little more from Kehl, I still think his fight with Beztati was pretty solid. Comfortable title defense for Beztati against a Kehl who to be fair did fight with his left eye pretty much closed for most of the rounds.
+ Considering the enormous difference in high level experience, I thought Verhoeven vs. Laïdouni was okay. Rico did try to hurt Laïdouni, but Laïdouni mostly weathered the storm and had a few flurries himself. I do think he showed Rico too much respect, but his backpedal style is tailor made for Rico to begin with. Laïdouni did better against Rico than Cookie did.
+ While obviously a step down from the previous quarter-finals, I didn't mind Khachab vs. Adegbuyi. Khachab did well against the seasoned Adegbuyi. Benny started well enough with the lowkicks, but tired out quickly. Khachab's weight hanging on him certainly didn't help.
+ Credit where credit's due: Rajabzadeh is the real deal. Today's Cookie was much sharper than he was against Rico, but Bahram still was more than he could handle.
+ Rigters/Uku was crazy. I still have to see the first round, but what I saw was wild and I'm happy glad 'tournament caution' flew right out of the window lol.
+ Kepenek/Bławdziewicz was a solid reserve fight, better than their first encounter. In the first it looked like Michal would be able to take revenge, but Kepenek woke up in the second and make quick work of his opponent. Three fights, three losses for Bławdziewicz. Wonder what's next for him as he simply seems to fall short at this level.

The Bad
- The (temporary) dip in quality after Bahram/Cookie was notable.
- A few times the energy at the venue felt particularly bad, like fights could break out at any moment. Probably an unpopular thing to say, but nights like these make me doubt whether Dutch crowds deserve events like this.
- Maikel Polanen stepping into the ring after Abena's cheap shot and almost getting into a fight with the ref. Tarik could have been disqualified then and there as seconds are not allowed in the ring during rounds.
- I might have spoken too soon as the scuffle between Rico and Jamal may have been even worse than Rico/Khachab. I wonder what'll happen to Jamal. Is he gonna get reprimanded or will Glory milk this for all it's worth to hype up a rematch between Rico and Jamal?
- Khachab/Verhoeven. Easily the worst fight and low point of the night.
- Rigters/Rajabzadeh: The result. Rajabzadeh lost the semi-final because of a knockdown based on a knee to his shoulder. Levi had to endure that awful post-fight crowd reaction due to a mistake of the ref. To be fair, it was kinda hard to make out what happened in the heat of the moment, which is why I think something like VAR should be introduced to Kickboxing.
- While I didn't mind bracket B of the tournament, it was more or less the drop in quality I expected compared to bracket A. Nobody is convincing me Rico's road to the final would have been just as comfortable against Uku/Levi/Bahram/Cookie.
- Videoland did a lot of backstage filming/interviews which I'm not a fan of. They even filmed some post-fight medical checks which I feel is kinda not-done. They tried to do that with Uku as well and someone from his team slammed the door shut in their face lol.
- Khachab really needs to lose weight. Despite using his weight to his advantage and having a good gas tank relative to his size, he'd have a higher volume and would be more explosive if he shed some of that flab. Manhoef keeps saying people should judge Khachab on his ability to fight rather than his appearance, but the reality is that his body literally gets in the way of his ability to fight. Also, it's just dangerously unhealthy.
- Moroccan/Dutch fanboys doing what they do best: behaving shamefully.
- Not sure how accurate this is, but I read on MixFight that only 60% of the tickets were sold.
- More of a technical complaint, but Videoland doesn't have a rewind option for live streams. Should be easy enough to implement with a player update, unless it's a rights issue.

Sidenotes
* Melvin criticizing the same ref (during Abena/Khbabez) for yelling stop from far away.
* Ref coming back on his 8-count during Abena/Khbabez. I think this is only the second time I saw it happen. IIRC the last time was during Saki/McSweeney.

[K1power]

Rico just went on an anti-Jamal rant in a Dutch post-fight interview lol.
Said he doesn't want to fight Jamal again and that he should be banned from the sport.

[K1power]

Khbabez just made a peace offer to Abena in a post-fight interview and said now he's coming for Rico's HW belt and is gonna kill him lol.

[Fox]

I missed Kehl vs Bextati, how was it?

Also I missed the quarterfinals, anyone got vids or HLs?

[K1power]

Beztati pretty comfortably outscored Kehl, but it was still entertaining.

Kehl tried his best to bring the fight to Beztati, but ultimately couldn't overcome Tyjani's reach/height advantage.

In round 2 Kehl's left (?) eye was hit/scratched by something Tyjani threw and he fought the rest of the fight with his eye pretty much closed. His body was pretty scratched up by the numerous body kicks/teeps as well.

As for the quarterfinals I only saw some social media clips here and there, but haven't seen the full event/fights pop up one some of the usual channels yet.

Edit: Oh yeah, Beztati said in a post-fight interview he's been dealing with a medical condition and was in and out of the hospital for the past week, but didn't want to cancel the fight. He didn't exactly want to disclose what it was, but at some point he more or less misspoke and said something along the lines of "I have a hole in my body". Pretty concerning, hopefully it's nothing serious.