UFC: China’s Li Jingliang stops ‘King of Kung Fu’ Muslim Salikhov; Su Mudaerji choked out by Matt Schnell in bloody scrap
- Chinese stars Li and Su returned to the Octagon with mixed results at Saturday’s UFC Long Island event in New York
- ‘The Leech’ defeats Salikhov by second-round TKO, while ‘The Tibetan Eagle’ suffers second-round submission in Fight of the Night
Chinese mixed martial arts stars Li Jingliang and Su Mudaerji returned to the Octagon with mixed results at Saturday’s UFC Long Island event in New York.
“The Leech” had a tough first round, as Salikhov let fly with plenty of his patented spinning kicks and grounded the fight with a takedown.
Things went much better for Li in round two, as the pair began to throw heavy artillery at each other with little regard for combinations or defence. That tempo change served him well, as he ultimately stung the Russian Sanda specialist with a big right hand, then finished him off with the a second right and a volley of elbows on the mat for a US$50,000 bonus-winning TKO.
“It was my pleasure fighting with him,” Li said through an interpreter in his post-fight interview. “Muslim is not only a Sanda legend in China, it’s worldwide.
“I’ve known him since I first started training in 2008. It’s my super pleasure fighting him.”
Li (19-7) is one of the China’s most accomplished fighters. He is currently ranked No 14 in the stacked UFC welterweight division, and while his win over the unranked Salikhov might not move him up the rankings, it separated him from a lopsided submission loss to surging contender Khamzat Chimaev.
While Li will return to China with a reason to celebrate, his countryman Su Mudaerji was not so lucky.