Read right the way through to the end… TRUST US.
32 started but only two can fight it out for a UFC contract on the biggest stage of all.
Four fighters remained standing on the final episode of the 22nd season of The Ultimate Fighter as Artem Lobov met Julian Erosa while two Europeans went head-to-head with Saul Rogers v Marcin Wrzosek in the other semi-final.
Conor McGregor had gotten three fighters to the final four while Urijah Faber had just the one representing the U.S.A. in the semis.
The teammates and close friends went first with tournament favourite Rogers taking on Poland’s Wrzosek.
Bolton’s Rogers took the centre of the octagon first and was coming off better in the early exchanges, landing an overhand right and hard leg kick to Wrzosek.
After a back-and-forth opening minute, Rogers reverted to what he does best and shot on a takedown, ending up in Wrzosek’s half-guard.
While Wrzosek did well to regain guard and look to wall-walk to his feet, Rogers intelligently sucked his hips out from under him and kept his opponent on his back.
That was until the two minute mark of the round when The Polish Zombie did create some space on the mat and battle his way back to a standing position.
Rogers didn’t look out of place there though as another overhand right stumbled Wrzosek before he connected with a leaping left hook.
Yet another takedown from the Brit late on in the round meant that it was an easy one to score and Rogers already had one foot in the finale.
Rogers’ comfortability was clear at the start of the second round as he landed a combination before backing perfectly out of Wrzosek’s range
A right hand behind the ear was the Polish lightweight’s first strike of any significance to that point but that was the prompt for Rogers to go back to his bread and butter with yet another takedown.
From half-guard, Rogers pinned Wrzosek’s right arm with his left knee before switching to his back and sneaking a hook in.
Tha Hangman was relentless on the mat with ground and pound but used a sloppy exit from his opponent to grab a hold of a high-crotch single leg to take Wrzosek down for the last time.
Rogers sunk in one hook, dragged Wrzosek backwards and went through all the necessary stages to finish with a beautiful rear naked choke to reach the finals.
Next it was the turn of Artem Lobov to attempt to make it an all European final as he faced Team U.S.A. lightweight Julian Erosa.
The usual “nice and flowy” cry rang out from Coach McGregor on the bleachers and Lobov remained faithful to his striking style of dropping his hands to his hips while keeping a wide stance.
The Russian Hammer played out McGregor’s gameplan to a tee as he began countering Erosa’s single shots with simple, yet powerful, combinations.
The fight was over, in truth, before it even got going as Erosa overshot with a right hand that was deftly punished by a clean left hook from Lobov.
Two more crunching lefts sent Erosa stumbling backwards and the SBG fighter made it three knockouts out of three by finishing on the ground in brutal fashion.
So, there we HAD it. It was looking like Artem Lobov v Saul Rogers in an all European final to see who would earn the UFC contract but you always have to expect the unexpected.
With seconds left in the final episode, we learned that Saul Rogers had to be removed from the TUF finale card after lying on his Visa application.
The UFC were forced to select a replacement and, rather than vote for one of the beaten semi-finalists, they went for established BJJ black belt Ryan Hall.
Hall had been beaten in the quarter-finals by Saul Rogers but was always one of the favourites to go the whole way in the competition and now gets his second chance against Lobov, who himself was given a second chance at the beginning of the tournament.
It’s striker versus grappler. It’s knockout power versus slick Jiu-Jitsu. It’s Europe versus U.S.A.
Catch The Ultimate Fighter at 3am GMT every Thursday morning on BT Sport (part of the Setanta pack in Ireland). Repeated at 10pm GMT on Thursdays.
