‘The Prince’ Verhoeven remains king of the heavyweight division

Rico ‘The Prince’ Verhoeven met bitter rival Errol ‘The Bonecrusher’ Zimmerman in the main event of GLORY 19 for a five-round World Heavyweight Championship fight.

The encounter had been hotly anticipated ever since Zimmerman earned a title shot by winning the Heavyweight Contender Tournament in May last year. He and Verhoeven were 1-1 against each other, with Zimmerman having scored a quick KO win in a 2012 fight and Verhoeven having won the 2013 rematch.

Lots of talk was exchanged in the build-up to this grudge match and tension was high on both sides. It was released as soon as the opening bell sounded. They charged towards each other like bulls and immediately began trading heavy leather.

“I really got carried away in the first round because there was just so much emotion behind the fight. When I hurt Errol early and got him in trouble I just wanted to finish him,” said Verhoeven post-fight.

“But my corner were going crazy and shouting for me to stick to the gameplan because when you rush in on someone you open yourself up and make it into a 50-50 fight when there is no need to.”

One of the barbs Zimmerman aimed at Verhoeven in the build-up was a claim that his knockout percentage was too low for a heavyweight champion. Verhoeven force-fed him those words early, crashing a hard right hand into Zimmerman’s unprotected jaw and looking like he very nearly ended the fight before the 30 second mark.

Zimmerman survived it and total carnage followed. Verhoeven had smelled blood and was off the leash, swarming Zimmerman in a manner we have never before seen from the young champion. His corner team were shouting themselves hoarse trying to get Verhoeven back onto the more careful gameplan and out of the whirlwind brawl, but he wasn’t listening.

In the end he was proved right as put Zimmerman down for a count with just under a minute left in the first round. Huge shots were exchanged on the restart and both ate power-punches without being able to find a fight-ender of their own.

The second round was a hugely entertaining brawl like the first, Verhoeven looking to prove a point to his detractors and to Zimmerman as he sought to put ‘The Bonecrusher’ away. It was a Verhoeven showcase and he looked in absolute control, the only real danger to his health being when he got into enthusiastic exchanges and lowered his guard while doing so.

Frustrated, Zimmerman tried some new tactics. He tried to back Verhoeven up and hit him with a spinning heel-kick to the body. But it went wrong - he himself collapsed to the mat in agony. Something had gone wrong with his knee (it would later turn out to be a torn or dislocated patella) and he was unable to stand.

After some conference between officials the fight was waved off, with the win being recorded as a TKO for Verhoeven. It was a somewhat anti-climatic ending to a war of a fight, but a win is a win nonetheless.

“That wasn’t the way that I wanted the fight to end and even though me and Errol are professional rivals you never want to see anyone get an injury like that. So I hope that he recovers well from it and gets back to competition,” says Verhoeven.

“But certainly I think that if the injury didn’t happen he wouldn’t have made it to the fifth round. The fight wouldn’t have gone to the fifth, absolutely not, I am sure of that. I would have finished it.

“I would have liked to get the KO because it would have nice, both to answer critics who say I don’t knock people out enough and also because it would have been good to knock Errol out with the same combination he knocked me out with in our first fight.”

Now Verhoeven moves to 7-2 in GLORY and looks likely to be a dominant champion for some time. Attention always turns to the next bout in the aftermath of a bout, but no immediate contender stands out for Verhoeven.

“Next, I don’t know. I think Benjamin Adegbuyi is emerging as a contender but he didn’t fight any really top-level guys yet so I don’t know if we could call him a contender right now,” he says.

“First things first I am going back home to the Netherlands to see my family and relax for a few days, then we will see what comes next.”