GLORY 10 LOS ANGELES was a critical event for the lightweight division. Several key bouts on the card had implications for the four-man tournament taking place at GLORY 12 NEW YORK on November 23.
Also in contention was the lightweight division’s number one ranking spot. Robin Van Roosmalen would take pole position if he was victorious in his main event fight with the Albanian-Swiss veteran Shemsi Beqiri.
Happily for Van Roosmalen that is exactly what happened. He took a unanimous decision win over Beqiri after a hard but technical three-round fight and now moves up one place to stand at #1 in the world at 70 kilograms (154 lbs) with a total of 872 points.
Giorgio Petrosyan, considered the pound-for-pound best kickboxer of all time, now drops to the #2 spot previously occupied by Van Roosmalen. He needs to get active against top-ranked opposition if he is to regain the spot he has occupied for so long. He stands at 769 points.
He will get his chance at GLORY 12 when he takes part in the four-man lightweight tournament taking place in New York, USA on November 23. His opponent in the semi-final stage will be Andy ‘The Machine’ Ristie.
Ristie won at GLORY 10 against an unranked opponent, Niclas Larsen, and as a result he has exchanged places in the rankings with Davit Kiria. Former #4 Kiria beat Murthel Groenhart to move up one place to #3 with 726 points. Despite the loss, Groenhart has maintained his #7 ranking.
Kiria will face Van Roosmalen in the other semi-final match taking place at the GLORY 12 tournament. The two have fought once before, when Kiria was an unknown. Now he is making a name for himself and a win over Van Roosmalen would be huge for his career.
American lightweight Ky Hollenbeck climbs three places for his win over Albert Kraus. The performance was one of Hollenbeck’s career-best and was all the more impressive for the fight having been taken on two weeks’ notice. Hollenbeck stands at #8 with 422 points.
French fighter Johann Fauveau has dropped out of the lightweight Top Ten after losing to Hinata of Japan by way of third-round KO. He suffered numerous leg kicks and was so badly damaged that his corner threw in the towel. He falls from #9 to #12.
Hinata, who was making his GLORY debut, climbs five places to #11. Another performance like GLORY 10 will see him crack the Top Ten for himself, immediately making him one of Japan’s most prominent fighters on the world scene.
Middleweight top dog Artem Levin lost to Joe ‘Stitch Em Up’ Schilling in a thrilling finale to the Middleweight tournament, but that hasn’t dislodged him from the #1 spot. He holds his position there by quite a large margin at 1020 points
Winning the tournament has elevated Shilling three places in the rankings and he now sits at #2 at 792 points. With Levin demanding a rematch, the chances are the two could meet again in the near future. Their rivalry looks set to become heated.
Jason Wilnis and Kengo Shimizu lost their semi-final matches in the middleweight tournament. They both fall one place, Wilnis to #5 and Shimizu to #7. Replacing Shimizu as world #6 is Wayne Barrett, who stopped fellow New York man Robby Plotkin in the first round to rise one place in the rankings at 495 points.
There was only one fight in the light-heavyweight division at GLORY 10, an All-American clash between Brian Collette and Randy Blake. The fight also pitted Muay Thai against Karate. It was Collette who took the win, the bragging rights and a three-place rise to the #8 position at 516 points.
Jahfarr Wilnis was a big winner in the heavyweight division. His stunning second-round KO of Brice Guidon saw him rise six places to #11 with 365 points. In the process he has knocked Guidon down two places; the Frenchman now sits at #14.
GLORY’s next event takes place Saturday, October 12 at the Sears Center in Hoffman Estates, Illinois. GLORY 11 CHICAGO will air live on SPIKE TV and features a four-man Heavyweight Championship Tournament and a long-awaited grudge rematch between Tyrone Spong and Nathan ‘Carnage’ Corbett.
