Cage Warriors 99 preview

Saturday sees Cage Warriors head to Colchester for their penultimate show of the year, and what was looking to be a big card has just taken a big hit.

The Flyweight championship match between Nathan Greyson and Blaine O’Driscoll has been scrapped just three days out from the show, after Greyson (the champion) announced he was not going to be able to make championship weight. This means the fight between Jason Radcliffe and James Webb has been bumped up from the co-main to the main event, in what looks to be a fantastic middleweight scrap.

Radcliffe comes into this fight with a 13-6 record, with “The Assassin” finishing all 13 of his wins, nine by KO/TKO and the remaining four via submission. His last bout was a first round submission loss against Vinicius Moreira. He’ll look to get back to winning ways against Webb, who holds a 4-1 record, with all his wins coming via submission.

Webb’s submission game could be Radcliffe’s downfall, with half of Radcliffe’s losses coming via submission, while Webb has not been finished, with his only loss being a unanimous decision to Miro Jurkovic.

Also on the card, Mads Burnell and Lukasz Rajewski will take each other on in a featherweight clash. Burnell comes in with a 9-3 record, with five wins coming via submission and the remaining four via decision, whilst “Raju” comes in with an 8-3 record, with five wins coming via KO/TKO. This fight looks to be a showcase of each mans style, and with both men possessing finishing ability, it looks unlikely that this fight will go the distance.

In the Bantamweight division, Gavin Kelly is set to take on Cory Tait as both men look to end their two fight losing streaks.

Kelly comes in with a 7-5 record, and his record perfectly shows how dynamic he is, with two KO/TKO wins, three submissions and two decisions, showing that he is well equipped no matter where the fight goes. Tait meanwhile comes in at 8-4 with his wins being equally divided between submissions and KO/TKOs. I personally think this is Kelly’s fight to win though, as he has been a lot more active, last fighting at Cage Warriors 91 in March, whilst Tait hasn’t fought since 2016.

In the Welterweight division, “Mr Bag and Tag” Nathan Jones (11-9) will look to end his four fight losing streak when he takes on “The Crazy Kid” Brad Wheeler (17-12).

Jones hasn’t won a fight since May last year, but should have some confidence coming into this fight after a successful WKU World Kickboxing Championships where he took the Silver medal in Light Contact, Full Contact and Kumate, with gold in the team Light Contact and Low Kick events where he competed alongside Aaron Cobley and Jamaine Hemmings, two of the best kickboxers in the world, who Jones will have no doubt learnt off.

Wheeler won’t be an easy fight for Jones though, with “The Crazy Kid” having a wealth of experience and a submission game that rivals Jones own, with Wheeler having 12 submission wins whilst Jones has nine submission wins. This fight will be an exciting one to watch no doubt.

Phil Wells (11-5) and Jamie Richardson (6-5) are also set to go to war in the Welterweight division. Wells will be coming into this fight as the favourite, as he is currently on a two fight winning streak and knows that this win could put him in a title eliminator for his next fight.

Richardson, meanwhile, hasn’t won a fight since September last year, with a decision loss to Sam Boult and a submission loss to Aaron Khalid in his last two fights.

I personally think this is Wells’ fight to win, and I expect him to use his superior striking to knockout Richardson, which will be the seventh KO of Well’s career.

What fight are you looking forward to on Saturday? Let me know on Twitter by tweeting me @Cobleyreporting.