Rich Franklin unanimously outpoints Wanderlei Silva to grab first win in 2 years – UFC News
Rich Franklin, the former UFC middleweight champion, made an impressive comeback by grabbing a unanimous decision win against fan favourite Brazilian pounder Wanderlei Silva, former Pride middleweight champion, in a five-round non-title bout held on June
23, 2012.
The duo headlined Ultimate Fighting Championship’s UFC 147 pay-per-view and met at the octagon set up at Estadio Jornalista Felipe Drumond in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. The showdown was co-headlined by the heavyweight non-title bout between Fabricio Werdum
and Mike Russow.
Franklin, 37, also known as ‘Ace’, basically a last minute replacement for Vitor Belfort, was in desperate need to collect a win. As far as the resume goes, Rich was entering the career’s 36th bout. The Ohio proud has nailed a total 28 opponents, 15 of them
via knockout, 10 by submission and just three by decision.
His Saturday night opponent, Silva, 35, not only had the home town advantage but also had a hefty mixed martial art experience in his gear. Widely known as ‘The Axe Murderer’, Silva was entering for the 48th time in the octagon.
The Brazilian proud has collected a huge 24 of his total 34 wins by knockout and is well known for being a lethal knockout specialist. The odds from the very beginning were in favour of Silva but nobody knew that Rich will outscore the Brazilian in front
of his fans quite easily.
During the whole five-round showdown, Rich concentrated on setting and controlling the pace of the bout. Things got out of hand when in the second round Silva came forward aggressively and connected a series of jabs that almost stunned Franklin.
Even after the bout, Rich admitted that he got blanked out by the knockout jabs. Franklin stated, “Honestly, I remember in between the second round and the next thing I know it's the fifth round. I remember my corner saying, 'It's the fifth round,' and I'm
like, 'Cool – only one left.' I don't remember (the punch that knocked me down). When that kind of stuff happens, you remember bits and pieces.”
Silva, later on confessed that he was unable to capitalise the moment and lost all his gas in that second-round clobbering. With the bout entering the fifth round, Wanderlei started to get sluggish which gave Rich a golden opportunity to connect strikes.
In the last few seconds of the fifth round, Silva seemed to show some last-minute energy and threw well placed jabs but it was too late. The judges unanimously gave the decision in favour of Rich who received 49-46 on all three cards.
After the bout Silva while sharing his thoughts stated, “I thought I was going to knock him out in the second round, and I was sorry I wasn't able to. Yes, I (burned myself out). I pushed it a bit too much. I really wanted to knock him out.”
With this win Rich is now again back in the game and will most probably move down in the division. Silva, on the other hand, has lost yet another bout to Franklin in addition to breaking his win streak.
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