Former UFC heavyweight title challenger, Antonio ‘Bigfoot’ Silva was recently released from the UFC after losing four fights in a row. After his dream of becoming a UFC champion ended, he continued his career outside the UFC only to lose his first fight since his departure, at RCC Boxing Promotions in Yekaterinburg, Russia.
Bigfoot’s opponent Ivan Shtyrkov came into the fight with an undefeated record of 5-0, being relatively inexperienced compared to his opponent.
Silva showed resilience in the fight but ultimately lost via unanimous decision. According to Mmafighting.com, the fight should have stopped when Shtyrkov was constantly striking Silva who didn’t defend well and stayed in a turtle position.
Also read: UFC News: Big Foot Silva released from UFC
But the fight went on as the referee decided to give the former UFC fighter a chance to continue. The first round could have been scored in favour of either of the fighters with both of them landing significant offence onto each other.
In the later rounds, the Russian fighter dominated to win the fight with all the judges scoring in his favour. Thus, Silva was forced to leave the ring with yet another loss. The Brazilian fighter is now 37 years old and has only bagged a single victory in his last nine fights.
Silva’s last battle inside the UFC’s Octagon was against Roy Nelson back in September at UFC Fight Night: Cyborg vs. Lansberg. The Brazilian fighter was knocked out in the second round by Nelson who reluctantly finished Silva off despite asking ‘Big’ John McCarthy, the referee, to stop the fight.
Bigfoot now holds a 19-11 MMA record with 14 of the victories coming via way of knockouts.
You can watch the full fight between Antonio Silva and Ivan Shtyrkov below:
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