El Bouni vs Rajabzadeh Fight Preview

The Quarterfinal 4 fight preview of the GLORY Light Heavyweight Grand Prix is powered by Unibet.

The last of the four quarter-final matchups and probably the most interesting of them all. Morocco’s Ibrahim El Bouni (41-9-1, 22 KO) goes up against Azerbaijan’s Bahram Rajabzadeh (67-2, 59 KO) in what is a huge contrast of styles and personalities.

El Bouni is known for his methodical and systematic approach to fighting while Rajabzadeh is a wild and unpredictable berserker in the ring. There are a lot of questions heading into this one. Can El Bouni deal with Rajabzadeh’s forward pressure and offense or will this be the downfall for the popular Azerbaijani?

A good indication of how this fight could play out may be El Bouni’s last fight against Stefan Latescu, who, out of all the other Grand Prix entrants, has the most similar style to Rajabzadeh. The 31-year-old was overwhelmed in that fight and suffered a TKO loss following several knockdowns.

Known as ‘Mister Cool’ for a reason, El Bouni will need to call upon his calm nature and not get caught up in the moment of a Rajabzadeh offense which will come hard and relentless. His route to victory is to bide his time, weather the storm, and aim for a counter or pick up the pace heading into the second half of the fight.

Rajabzadeh, on the other hand, will be his traditional self with his power punches, unpredictable flurries of kicks & knees, and non-stop action. The ‘GLORY 2023 Breakout Fighter of the Year’ winner is one of the most fearless fighters in kickboxing today and is not afraid to receive damage as he goes for the “you hit me once, I’ll hit you twice” type of fighting.

GLORY Light Heavyweight Grand Prix Full Fight Card

Grand Prix Final
Winner of SF 1 vs. Winner of SF 2

Heavyweight
Murat Aygun (32-3, 8 KO) vs. Ionut Iancu (28-9, 10 KO)

Middleweight
#9 Ramy Deghir (6-1, 1 KO) vs. #10 Brice Kombou (18-3, 3 KO)

Semi-Final 2
Winner of QF3 vs. Winner of QF 4

Semi-Final 1
Winner of QF 1 vs. Winner of QF 2

Quarter-Final 4
#4 Ibrahim El Bouni (41-9-1, 22 KO) vs. #5 Bahram Rajabzadeh (67-2, 59 KO)

Quarter-Final 3
#2 Sergej Maslobojev (38-6, 23 KO) vs. #7 Bogdan Stoica (58-14, 40 KO)

Quarter-Final 2
#3 Stefan Latescu (17-2, 8 KO) vs. #1 Donegi Abena (27-10, 7 KO)

Quarter-Final 1
#C Tarik Khbabez (50-10-1, 28 KO) vs. #6 Pascal Toure (20-6, 7 KO)

Welterweight
Soufiane Abdelkhalek (4-2-1, 2 KO) vs. Ilyass Chakir (16-4-1, 6 KO)

Light Heavyweight Reserve Bout
#8 Mohamed Amine (29-7, 16 KO) vs. Cem Caceres (15-1, 12 KO)