On the newest version of The Final Fighter 33 (TUF), Staff Sonnen strove to increase their win streak to 2 in a row within the ultimate bout of the flyweight quarterfinals.
Surging Flyweight Prospects Duke It Out for Final Spot in TUF Semifinals
Getting their first victory within the competitors for the reason that very first episode of the season, Staff Sonnen halted the seemingly unstoppable warpath of Staff Cormier, who had beforehand defeated their rivals 4 instances back-to-back. Keen to stay within the win column, Sonnen assigned his final flyweight fighter remaining, Roybert Echeverria, to cope with Cormier’s Tumelo Manyamala.
Sizing Up Flyweight Roybert Echeverria
Competing out of Venezuela, Echeverria has been part of the combat recreation since making his newbie debut again in 2013. Turning skilled in 2020, “The Unbroken” shortly rattled off seven straight wins, logging 5 contests in 2021 alone. This extraordinarily lively schedule and intensive interval of domination led Echeverria to be chosen to look on Dana White’s Contender Sequence in 2022, the place he was sadly knocked out by Jafel Filho. Rebounding in glorious style, nonetheless, Echeverria proceeded to go 3-1 in his subsequent 4, incomes the Anthony Pettis FC flyweight strap in his newest outing to the cage.
Flyweight Tumelo Manyamala
Recognized to be a person who typically doesn’t require the choose’s scorecards to determine his matches, Manyamala stands as one of many high flyweight finishers on the South African blended martial arts scene. Realizing stoppages throughout all his six wins, which incorporates 5 knockouts, “Bones of Metal” has solely ever gone the space as soon as in his total profession in a shedding effort to the far more skilled Mark Climaco in early 2024.
TUF Flyweight Comeback for the Ages
Taking the initiative early, Echeverria started to slowly stalk his opponent, dodging a lot of the fast strikes from Manyamala, who displayed an extremely quick one-two mixture. That was till the final minute of the encounter when the South African dropped the Venezuelan with a thunderous proper hook, sending Echeverria plummeting to the canvas. Although he managed to outlive the spherical by the slimmest of margins, it was obvious to everybody that the Staff Sonnen flyweight was compromised.
Seemingly taking the identical strategy within the second, Echeverria opted to combine in grappling to his ahead strain, ultimately dragging Manyamala to the bottom. Not giving his foe any time to assume, “The Unbroken” wasted no time in organising a rear bare choke, which Manyamala surprisingly didn’t appear to combat in opposition to in any respect, permitting Echeverria to safe the faucet and hand Staff Sonnen their second consecutive triumph. The staff is now 3-4 within the season, almost tying Staff Cormier on the scoreboard.
