Worldwide MMA Preview – Fight Nights 46 and Jungle Fight 86

Fight Nights 46 from Russia opens up the weekend’s action on Friday at 4pm BST and the card is streaming live on UFC Fight Pass. The main event is a heavyweight fight between Mikhail Mokhnatkin and Alexei Kudin. Mokhnatkin usually fights at light heavyweight and has a 8-1-1 record. He comes from a Sambo background and has wins over Valentijn Overeem and UFC veteran Ednaldo Oliveira. He drew with Rizin GP runner up Jiri Prochazka and has seven finishes amongst his eight wins, with five submissions. At only 26 he is one of the best light heavyweight prospects in the world and could be snapped up soon by the UFC with an impressive performance. Kudlin is far more experienced with 30 fights in his career which has mainly taken place in Russia but includes one fight in Bellator.

The co-main event is a 161 pound catchweight bout featuring Alexander “Tiger” Sarnavskiy and Dmitry Bikrev. Sarnavskiy had a long and quite successful tenure in Bellator. In his previous fight he dropped a decision to Murad Machaev which leaves his record at 32-4. Bikrev has a startling lack of experience in comparison with a 5-2 record but he has won two fights in a row in Fight Nights recently at welterweight.

Also on the card is a fight at heavyweight between Segery Pavlovich and Baga Abaev. With the recent string of signings the UFC have made at heavyweight Pavlovich has a good case for being the best heavyweight left outside the major promotions. He is 6-0 with KO/TKO’s in all of his fights so far. His last fight was against Ruben Wolf who he beat in two minutes. Agaev is a veteran who has been in there with a lot of great fighters over the years, he has a 2011 win over Kevin Randleman for instance. He is experienced and competent in all areas so is a good opponent for Pavlovich right now.

Saturday night (11pm BST) brings us to Brazil for Jungle Fight 86 which features two title fights. In the main event featherweight champion Maike Linhares will defend his belt against Josenaldo Silva. Silva is on a 16 fight winning streak and stopped 13-2 Anderson dos Santos to earn a shot at Linhares. Linhares won the vacant Jungle Fight title via choke against Rodrigo Praia last year to bring his record to 9-0 but he dropped a lackluster decision to Soo Chul Kim at Rizin on New Years Eve for the first defeat of his career.

In the co-main event Jonas Bilharinho will fight Valdines Silva for the the featherweight title. Bilharinho is the former Jungle Fight bantamweight and featherweight champion. He left the promotion to claim the 1 Round Combat featherweight belt but is now back in Jungle Fight. Bilharinho was famously brought in by Jose Aldo to emulate Conor McGregor. He has looked excellent in his MMA career so far with a record of seven wins and one draw with only one of his wins going to a decision. Silva will be no pushover though, he is riding a five fight winning streak since losing to Thomas Almeida with all of the wins being finishes.

Finally, on Saturday night (1am BST) Titan FC streams live from Miami, Florida on UFC Fight Pass. Steve Carl and Belal Muhammad will meet in the main event for the vacant welterweight title. Carl is a former WSOF champion who competed on The Ultimate Fighter for American Top Team. His last fight was a win in Russia against Beslan Ushukov. Muhammad has an 8-0 record which includes two fights in Bellator. He won two fights in Titan in 2015 to get this shot at the vacant title.

The co-main event features a clash between lightweights Jason Novelli and Yosdenis Cadeno. Novelli is a veteran of Titan and Super Fight League and the only defeat on his 11-1 record comes to Ben Fodor. For Cedeno this is first fight outside the octagon after a disappointing 1-3 run in the UFC culminated with defeat to Cody Pfister.