Review of SFL1
Review of SFL 1 by Team Shaheen fighter Afnan Iftikhar
Super Fight League founded by Raj Kundra (owner Rajhistan Royals – cricket team) and Sanjay Dutt (Bollywood superstar) under the umbrella of Super Fight Promotions had its inaugural event SFL-1 on March 11, 2012.
Branded with the slogan “Come for the concert, stay for the fights” and headlining the event with Bop Sapp vs. James Thompson, it seemed the show wouldn’t disappoint in terms of production value. Good camera work, fireworks, ring girls, A-list Indian celebrities, choreographed dances after fights, a Russian ring announcer (Russian version of Bruce buffer?) made the show interesting. The appeal was also boosted with Herb Dean refereeing – one of the best veteran referees out there and Phil Baroni as one of the commentators who was very insightful with his comments.
As was intended, the fights were to promotes Indian fighters, and some Indian fighters which left a mark were Muhammad Shahid – you could see that he’s gone through some good training and was pressing the action against his opponent especially against the cage in the clinch where most of the action took place. The fight lasted the three rounds with the judges giving Shahid the decision. It was later revealed that Shahid had popped his shoulder in the second round showing that the Indian fighter has a lot of heart. other notable fights were Lakhwinder Singh’s knock out of Sri lankan knock out of Madhura but the highlight fight for me was the woman’s fight, what great back and forth action and the technical proficiency of the ladies both on the feet and the ground was really impressive. It seemed like the Ukrainian fighter would win via arm bar couple of times but she was reversed and at the end the Serbian fighter reversed in a scramble on the ground, got a rear naked choke and got the W via tap out. The main fight had 600 pounds of brawn in the ring, the fight had its moments of excitement with the opponents getting the top position on the ground but it was short lived as bob sapp asked to stop the fight to what seemed like a quad injury. Sapp, it seemed, looked clueless on the ground as always and his fitness was in question. That being said the fight was meant to be a crowd puller anyway than a technical war.
A few things that could have been done better. It seemed that the focus was more on the celebrities in the crowd than the fighters themselves as the camera panned out in the middle of a fight to show a celebrity in attendance. Also, no fighters interviews were seen even for the winners although we could see a lot of celeb Q&As. Also fighters were heavily marketed with just SFL as both walk in music and fighter shorts were both of SFL. And the walk ins were too short. As a suggestion, SFL could let fighters have their own walk in music and attire/brand of fighter wear. All in all the show was great in terms of entertainment value and the sport of mma has arrived in the sub continent for sure.
Here is a list of the official results.
1) Xavier Foupa-Pokam def. Joey Guel via TKO (cut) at the end of round 1.
2) Jimy Ambriz def. Satish Jha via TKO (punches) in round 1.
3) Lakwinder Sekhon def. Madura Rathnayake via TKO (punches) in round 1.
4) Mohammed Shahid def. Myura Dissanayake via Majority Decision
5) Chaitanya Gavali def. Tiran Thakshala via Unanimous Decision
6) Travis Bell def. Neil Natasadu via Submission (forearm choke) in round 2.
7) Sanja Sucevic def. Lena Ovchynnikova via Submission (rear naked choke) in round 2.
8) James Thompson def. Bob Sapp via Submission (leg cramp) in round 1.