UFC 304 – Edwards vs Muhammad 2 LIVE: Fight card, scorecards, updates

Fair play to Allen, he is putting himself in range against a lethal striker but getting his own shots off. No sign of a takedown attempt so far and this is a really close fight. Chikadze is bleeding from the mouth and visibly slowing down but that muscle memory of movement is still serving him well. It could all come down to this last round coming up.

A great first round. Chikadze has exactly the fight he wants early on, circling on the outside and landing his deadly kicks to the legs and body with a few thrown up top for good measure. Allen continues to press regardless and lands the punch of the round, a big right hand before eating a kick himself late on. A close one to call.

Allen lost his last fight to Holloway and is looking to reach back up to the top of the featherweight division by beating the dangerous Chikadze tonight. His kicks are deadly and the Ipswich man will know that only too well. He can set the momentum going for the crowd here and launch this main card in style.

If you ever get to one of these big UFC cards, spend a couple of minutes just watching Bruce Buffer, it’s such great value.

A huge roar goes up and interrupts what appears to be the first crowd fight of the night which has the attention of one half of the arena, from cageside it looked like a fair bit of flailing without much tekkers or co-ordination. Aspinall’s appearance on the screen has the fans refocused on the action and his heavyweight showdown in the co-main should be a belter.

MAIN CARD:

Arnold Allen vs Giga Chikadze

Christian Leroy Duncan vs Gregory Rodrigues

Bobby Green vs Paddy Pimblett

Tom Aspinall vs Curtis Blaydes

Leon Edwards vs Belal Muhammad

Brits are back on top as Wood deservedly takes home the win. His performance in the second round in particular was dazzling and on another night would’ve had his opponent out of there. Credit to the toughness of Pineda.

That became far more uncomfortable than it needed to be for Wood. Pineda had him down early in the third and kept him there which actually did very little for either man. Wood was taking punishment and Pineda was in a position he couldn’t really win from.

Wood connects with a big shot early in the round, instantly swelling the eye of Pineda, who then claims to have been struck in the groin, though the replay suggests he may have been milking it with the Brit on the charge. After the fight resumes, Wood drops him with two low kicks in a row, his striking prowess clear to see. He drops Pineda yet again late in the round and the ref has a long look at it, but his opponent survives.

Wood drops Pineda – it seemed to be a delayed reaction to a body shot, a kick up the middle. But the American recovered well and even ended the round on top after a brilliant sweep before landing some heavy ground and pound to close it out.

Can Wood help the Brits bounce back to winning ways in our featured pre-lim here? That defeat for McCann sucked some of the energy out of the arena.

McCann has to go back to the drawing board. Perhaps over five rounds her tenacity might have shone through more and it became more even in the third as she threw the kitchen sink at it.

Brasil takes the victory and the damage was done with some heavy work in the first round, though who knows how much that groin strike took out of her.

McCann threw everything at that third round. She rose from multiple takedowns, landed a couple of big shots and walked into the fire to risk being knocked out but Brasil took them well. Meatball also had her opponent’s back for a short time but the crowd were left disappointed as position was reversed. In the end McCann was well beaten tonight despite showing her usual heart.

Meatball needs to pull this out the fire, she’s two down now.

She works hard to secure a takedown but then let’s Brasil up almost immediately. Brasil then takes her down and lands some big shots. McCann is throwing caution to the wind but hasn’t managed to land a defining blow yet. She has five minutes to find one.

Horrible groin strike early on puts McCann down and you don’t see that every day in the women’s game. She gingerly gets back into it but is dropped by a heavy body shot twice and Brasil doesn’t quite swarm. McCann looks like she’s on the way out but ties up her opponent to a massive roar and recovers on the fence, she then chases a takedown of her own to see out the first five but is badly swollen above the eye and looks compromised to the body.

Massive reception, the biggest of the night for Molly McCann. Can she do the business? We’re about to find out.

She looks a completely different fighter at strawweight and couldn’t believe the sight of her photo on UFC debut earlier this week. No doubt Molly McCann will be given a big reception here.

As expected, Hadley comes away with the win, albeit giving 20 percent of his purse away for missing weight. He won’t be thinking about that right now, though.

Another goes to the scorecards and both men raise their arms presuming victory after the final bell.

The third was a cagey round, Hadley on the back foot but picking and moving well, slightly sharper and his work should be enought to continue the Brit sweep, but when you go to the scorecards you never know.

Hadley is on the back foot and knows he has to get Loughran to respect his power, which he does with three straight left hands on the trot, the third of which connected at the same time as he absorbed a kick to the groin, stopping the fight while the Birmingham fighter caught his breath.

With 30 seconds to go, Loughran ends up on top and it might just have been enough to nick him the round.

Hadley lands some crisp, clean strikes to open up and his opponent is a split second too late on everything but grows in confidence later in the round and suddenly stalks forwards, throwing the heavier shots without connecting comprehensively. A strong sign for the Irishman going into the second.

England vs Ireland now. Can the Irish be the first country to stop the British charge tonight?

McCann isn’t next on deck, that’s Jake Hadley – who missed weight yesterday narrowly. But backstage, Meatball is on the prowl and getting ready for her clash with Bruna Brasil.

Not sure where a 30-27 has crept in but the Brit sweep is still on!

The victor says: ‘Manchester, what’s up! I am still young fighting veterans, I have the best team in the world, thank you for the support. In 2012 I was a refugee in this country and they accepted me. I want a title shot. Do I deserve a new UFC contract?’

Mokaev lands a sweet question mark kick early in the third after doctors checked Kape’s toe and he was able to carry on.

The key moment of the third came with two minutes left, Mokev securing a takedown and escaping a choke to end up on top, albeit eating some nasty elbows. The Brit then gave up his position with Kape scrambling to his feet for a final 30 seconds. A tough one to call…

Kape appears to have broken or dislocated his big toe and tries to fix it mid fight, which was not advisable as Mokaev instantly swarmed. The Brit then took his man down in a scramble but grabbed the shorts and was warned by the ref before being stood back up. Kape then took what he thought was an eye poke, turned his back and Mokaev chased him down again. A really bizarre fight so far. Probably Mokaev’s round.

Cheers turned to boos pretty quickly in the arena after about three minutes of not very much at all.

But then the round caught fire a bit, or at least threatened to. Kape landed a strong left and Mokaev shot unsucessfully, it was the best shot of the first stanza and probably did enough to give him the advantage.

Moments away from this one and the crowd have ratcheted things up a notch, it’s deafening in here and they smell blood.

A full house of wins for the Brits on the early pre-lims and Mokaev is out to continue that trend in the second portion of the show.

He’s undefeated in the UFC so far and while he was unable to become the youngest champ ever, he is still one of the sport’s rising stars.

It’s a real test against Kape tonight and the two of them have to be separated here in the cage before the fight even starts! This could be a mad one!

Mohammad Mokaev vs Manel Kape

Jake Hadley vs Caolan Loughran

Molly McCann vs Bruna Brasil

Nathanial Wood vs Daniel Pineda

The victorious Brit says: ‘It feels damn good to shut up the haters. You’re making a boy’s dreams come true Manchester. I’ve spent so much of my career defending wrestlers and I could see the takedowns coming. Undefeated and undisputed in the UFC like a true Welsh Gangster.’

Aspinall is one of the most well-rounded heavyweights out there and has a number of ways to win tonight. It’ll be a hugely tough match-up against Curtis Blaydes, who he headlined against in London before blowing out his knee after 13 seconds. Got to be a more satisfying conclusion tonight…

Sophie Ellis-Bextor would have been long odds to be on the UFC playlist tonight but in between the previous fight and Bukauskas’ win there, she had a play and actually went down pretty well with a crowd who are already completely absorbed by the fights so far. I’ve never seen it so packed for the early pre-lims but this lot are in it for the long haul.

Modestas Bukauskas and Marcin Prachnio have just put on a hell of a show for two-and-a-half rounds.

The Lithuanian-British light-heavyweight had his man rocked and close to going out in the second before he ate a mad head kick from short range to shift momentum.

In the third he absorbed another onslaught before securing a takedown and then choke to finish a very, very durable Prachnio.

What kind of reception will Paddy Pimblett get tonight? Liverpool poster boy in Mancunian territory. Will the home crowd get on board on is King Green going to enjoy more support than he otherwise would across the pond? It hasn’t been smooth for ‘The Baddy’ ahead of tonight and he opened up on his mental health struggles recently.

After a horrendous debut – getting brutally KO’d by Ashmouz, Patterson has bounced back with two first round finishes and tonight dispatched Kiefer Crosby with an arm triangle choke. It took a while to sink in and he moved to mount and then back again but eventually the tap came.

Parkin is now a perfect 10-0 with four of those coming in the UFC but that was his first finish in the big show. The 6ft 4in heavyweight’s star is very much on the rise.

Shauna Bannon opened up the early pre-lims and had the Irish fans in Co-op Live Arena buzzing with a split decision win.

Mick Parkin then took things to another decibel level entirely – smacking Łukasz Brzeski about with a big right hand over the jab before swarming and putting him down and out. Huge victory for the Englishman and hopefully a sign of things to come.

EARLY PRE-LIMS:

Shauna Bannon vs Alice Ardelean

Mick Parkin vs Lucasz Brzeski

Sam Patterson vs Kiefer Crosby

Modestas Bukauskas vs Marcin Prachnio

Oban Elliott vs Preston Parsons

Mohammad Mokaev vs Manel Kape

Jake Hadley vs Caolan Loughran

Molly McCann vs Bruna Brasil

Nathanial Wood vs Daniel Pineda

MAIN CARD:

Arnold Allen vs Giga Chikadze

Christian Leroy Duncan vs Gregory Rodrigues

Bobby Green vs Paddy Pimblett

Tom Aspinall vs Curtis Blaydes

Leon Edwards vs Belal Muhammad

October 2016 was the last time this behemoth of a travelling MMA roadshow hit Manchester, with Michael Bisping defending his belt against Dan Henderson.

It was a brutal start time for the locals back then, as it is tonight, but there’s plenty of action to stave the fatigue away, so strap in for the hours ahead. There are a host of top British fighters in action across the early pre-lims, pre-lims and main card later. Here we go!