JOHANNESBURG - The Mixed Martial Arts South Africa (MMASA) Amateur Championship kicked off in fine style at the AMMA Underground in Edenvale on Friday.
Fighters from across the country arrived in Gauteng to compete over three days - in an elimination-structured event - for spot in the South African teams set to participate in either the Youth IMMAF Championship (taking place in Turkey this July) or in the IMMAF World Championship (Nur Sultan, Kazakhstan) taking place in November/December.
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MMASA and Alpha Mixed Martial Arts (AMMA) put on an awesome show on day one which saw a total of 16 fights (Juniors and Seniors) take place.
Only three fights went the distance with the balance of the card leaving nothing to the judges with some fine TKOs and KOs.
Here are your results from Day one:
Fight 1: The Western Cape’s Aneesha Mayman beat Gauteng’s Saskia Jade Jantjes via ref’s stoppage in the second round.
Fight 2: Kwa-Zulu Natal’s Micheal Angelo Adriane succumbed to Gauteng’s Mathys du Randt’s rear-naked choke in the first round.
Fight 3: Gauteng’s Philani Shabalala got the TKO over Darren Revenscroft (Western Cape) in the second round.
Fight 4: Gauteng’s Mpumelelo Mngoma pulled off the beautiful Kimura choke forcing Kwa-Zulu Natal’s Sandile Luthi to tap.
Fight 5: KZN’s Sipho Mlaba got the win over the Western Cape’s Heinrich Jacobs via a split decision (30-27, 28-29, 29-28).
Fight six: Athenkosi Mongwe (Eastern Cape) tapped out to Jesse Schaper’s (Gauteng) rear-naked choke.
Fight 7: Gauteng’s Kyle Sham got the split decision over Tayyib Galdari from KZN.
Fight 8: Kevin Pretorius (Eastern Cape) dropped the first KO of the night beating KZN’s Nasiphi Vellem.
Fight 9: Gauteng’s Allistar Kunene got the unanimous decision (27-30, 27-30, 27-30) over Shayan Parboo (Eastern Cape).
Fight 10: KZN’s Abdur Rahmaan pulled off an armbar beating Mpumalanga’s Luke Stander.
Fight 11: Peace Nguphane (Gauteng) earned a ref’s stoppage via TKO in the first round over his KZN opponent, Philani Mbuyazi.
Fight 12 delivered one of the most craziest bouts in the history of South African MMA, following three rounds, the judges had a tie, this led to Adebayo Ojewole (KZN) losing to the Northern Cape’s Sarel du Plessis via unanimous decision after a fourth round.
Fight 13: Charl Adams (Eastern Cape) beat Mark Botha (KZN) via TKO due to strikes.
Fight 14: Western Cape’s Lesley Jacquelin beat Alex Awolaja (Gauteng) via TKO due to strikes.
Fight 15: Khaya Ntombela (KZN) stole the show with a quick KO 24 seconds into his bout with Zander Jansen van Rensburg (Gauteng).
The final fight of the day went to the Eastern Cape’s Tony Killian after he submitted Joubert Pienaar (Sedibeng) via a sneaky rear-naked choke in the second round.
You can stream the event via the Alpha Mixed Martial Arts promotion’s Facebook and YouTube page.
This copy is sponsored by The Capital Hotels and Apartments.