UFC 70
| UFC 70: Nations Collide | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 The poster for UFC 70: Nations Collide | ||||
| Promotion | Ultimate Fighting Championship | |||
| Date | April 21, 2007 | |||
| Venue | Manchester Evening News Arena | |||
| City | Manchester, United Kingdom | |||
| Attendance | 15,114 (12,708 paid)[1] | |||
| Total gate | $2,628,472 (£1.3 million GBP)[2] | |||
| Event chronology | ||||
| ||||
UFC 70: Nations Collide was the second UFC event held in the United Kingdom, and the first in Manchester on Saturday, April 21, 2007. UFC 70 was also only the seventh UFC event held outside the United States, and the first since UFC 38. The card was broadcast live on pay-per-view in the United Kingdom and Ireland on Setanta Sports.[3]
The televised card on Spike TV drew a 1.84 overall rating (2.8 million viewers), and at its highest point, UFC 70 drew 3.5 million viewers for the main event.[4]
Background
2006 PRIDE Open-Weight Grand Prix Champion, Mirko Cro Cop fought Heavyweight contender Gabriel Gonzaga in the main event to determine the top contender for the UFC Heavyweight Championship held by Randy Couture.[5]
The card also featured Michael Bisping fighting in England for the UFC for the first time against UFC veteran Elvis Sinosic and Andrei Arlovski taking on prize fighter and training partner of Mirko Cro Cop and future UFC Heavyweight Champion Fabrício Werdum, who was making his UFC debut.
Reports have indicated that the UFC was targeting this event for its debut on HBO, but negotiations with HBO were not completed in time for UFC 70. As a result, the card instead aired on Spike TV in North America at 9 pm EDT on a 6-hour tape delay.[6]
Lyoto Machida was originally scheduled to fight Forrest Griffin at this event, but Griffin became ill with a staph infection and could not compete on the card.[7]
Results
| Main card | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Weight class | Method | Round | Time | Notes | |||
| Heavyweight | Gabriel Gonzaga | def. | Mirko Cro Cop | KO (head kick) | 1 | 4:51 | [a] |
| Heavyweight | Andrei Arlovski | def. | Fabrício Werdum | Decision (unanimous) (30–27, 30–27, 30–27) | 3 | 5:00 | |
| Light Heavyweight | Michael Bisping | def. | Elvis Sinosic | TKO (punches) | 2 | 1:40 | |
| Light Heavyweight | Lyoto Machida | def. | David Heath | Decision (unanimous) (30–27, 30–26, 30–27) | 3 | 5:00 | |
| Heavyweight | Cheick Kongo | def. | Assuerio Silva | Decision (majority) (29–28, 29–28, 28–28) | 3 | 5:00 | |
| Preliminary card | |||||||
| Lightweight | Terry Etim | def. | Matt Grice | Submission (guillotine choke) | 1 | 4:48 | |
| Lightweight | Junior Assuncao | def. | David Lee | Submission (rear-naked choke) | 2 | 1:55 | |
| Light Heavyweight | Alessio Sakara | def. | Victor Valimaki | TKO (punches) | 1 | 1:44 | |
| Welterweight | Jess Liaudin | def. | Dennis Siver | Submission (armbar) | 1 | 1:19 | [b] |
| Welterweight | Paul Taylor | def. | Edilberto de Oliveira | TKO (head kick and punches) | 3 | 0:37 | |
- ^ UFC Heavyweight Championship title eliminator
- ^ This preliminary bout was aired on the broadcast after the Gonzaga-Cro Cop fight.
Bonus awards
The bonuses for this event were $30,000 each.
- Fight of the Night: Michael Bisping vs. Elvis Sinosic
- Knockout of the Night: Gabriel Gonzaga
- Submission of the Night: Terry Etim
See also
References
- ^ http://www.sherdog.com/news/articles.asp?n_id=7335
- ^ "UFC draws capacity crowd in Manchester". Virtual Manchester. 2007-04-22. Retrieved 2007-04-22.
- ^ Whitehead, Lee (2007-03-08). "LONDON CALLING: UFC & CAGE RAGE LOCK HORNS". MMAWeekly.com. Retrieved 2007-03-09.
- ^ Alvarez, Bryan (2007-04-24). "UFC 70 rating". F4WOnline.com. Retrieved 2007-04-24.
- ^ Mass Republican (2007-02-15). "Fighter faces Ultimate Challenge". Retrieved 2007-02-15.
- ^ Trembow, Ivan (2007-03-13). "UFC 70 WILL AIR ON SPIKE TV WITH TAPE DELAY". MMAWeekly.com. Retrieved 2007-03-13.
- ^ Gerbasi, Thomas (2007-03-15). "David Heath to Replace Griffin against Machida at UFC 70". UFC.com. Archived from the original on 2007-03-17. Retrieved 2007-03-15.
