UFC 105 was on the 14th November in Manchester, England at the M.E.N Arena.

This event proved once again that you dont need a card full of top 5 fighters in each division for some action packed fights. Funnily enough, the only fight I didn’t really enjoy on the night was the main event, Randy Couture vs Brandon Vera, which I’ll explain why later.

I’ll start with Ross Pearson vs Aaron Riley’s fight. Ross Pearson was crowned “The ultimate fighter” in season 9, but to be honest I wasn’t massively impressed with him in TUF and I certainly didn’t expect him to beat Andre Winner in the finale. However, I was amazed by his performance in this fight (his UFC debut) and I literally watched the whole fight without blinking and in awe at his abilities. Ross Pearson picked Aaron Riley apart (who is definitely no joke) before the ref stopped the fight on the doctors recommendation, in the second round, for a bad cut on the bridge of the nose of Riley. Ross mixed it up in the octagon with extremely accurate punches, kicks to the legs and body, muay thai clinches and knees, and finally a flying knee which caused the cut/broken nose of Aaron Riley on 4:38 of the 2nd round.

Matt “immortal” Brown fought the other winner of TUF season 9, James Wilks. James came out strongly in this fight but Matt Brown seemed to get stronger as the fight went on into the 3rd round. Brown somehow managed to defend a Kimura (which looked very painful) and reversed Wilks to mount him. From full mount, Matt Brown set about punishing Wilks with some hard blows, and Wilks’ only defence was to expose his back. Matt delivered a few more hard punches and hammer fists to the side of the head and the fight was stopped by the referee. Matt Brown wins at 2:27 of the 3rd round by TKO.

Now, what to say about Andre Winner’s fight against Rolando Delgado???! The fight started with both fighters exchanging. Rolando definitely needed to clinch Andre Winner and take him down, but it didn’t quite go that way… Andre showed his cockiness/confidence by regularly dropping his hands and weaving to dodge Rolando’s strikes. Andre Winner threw a powerful, lightning fast right hand which knocked Delgado out cold, and he even managed to get a couple of shots while his opponent was flat on the canvas before the ref stopped the fight. Andre Winner has probably the coolest surname in MMA, and is the “winner” of his UFC debut at 3:21 of the 1st round.

Mike Swick didn’t seem to be himself in his fight, against the UK’s Dan Hardy. I actually thought Swick would win this, but he was beaten at every aspect of the fight by Hardy. Hardy hurt Swick a few times in the fight and even managed to take Swick down towards the end. Dan Hardy wins by unanimous decision in front of his home crowd.

I’ll be the first to admit that I haven’t been very impressed with Denis Kang’s introduction into the UFC. Maybe a few years ago would of been perfect timing. He very nearly shut my mouth in the very first round against Michael Bisping. Bisping survived the first round by the skin of his teeth after being hurt, knocked down and then punished on the ground by some relentless ground and pound. Bisping even apologised to his coaches after the round ended. Obviously the gameplan went out the window. Bisping was a completely different fighter for the rest of the fight. He was able to take Denis Kang down a couple of times, which is where he punished Kang with some good punches and ended the fight by TKO at 4:24 of the 2nd round.

Randy Couture Vs Brandon Vera’s fight went almost exactly as I expected. Even though it wasn’t necessarily a crowd pleasing fight, Randy showed his experience and pulled off his gameplan to a T. He even said before the fight that his gameplan was to close Vera down to a clinch and make him wrestle and that’s exactly what he did for all 3 rounds. I actually forgot how good Vera’s wrestling base was and he consistently defended Randy Couture’s takedowns, but over the 3 rounds Randy controlled the pace and positions of the fight and wins by unanimous decision.

If you watched UFC 105 on ESPN in the UK, Spike in the USA, or anywhere else in the world, I’d love to hear your comments and views of the fights.