UFC Fight Night 160: Hermansson vs. Cannonier - Predictions and Picks

#2 Mark Madsen vs. Danilo Belluardo

This sounds like a bit of a bizarre main event given Mark Madsen is making his UFC debut and Danilo Belluardo is 0-1 in the promotion, but when you remember that Denmark is short on homegrown fighters – and Madsen is a 2016 Olympic silver medallist in Greco-Roman wrestling representing Denmark – then it makes perfect sense.

This isn’t Madsen’s MMA debut though; he’s actually been fighting since 2013 and took a break from the sport to compete in the Olympics, meaning he could be seen as quite a high-level prospect.

‘The Olympian’ (no points for an unimaginative nickname!) is 8-0 in MMA, with a healthy mixture of TKO stoppages, submissions and decisions to his name. A physical specimen at 155lbs, his wrestling highlight reel shows off some ridiculous throws and suplexes, while in MMA, he’s all brute force, showing insanely heavy hands and a power-based grappling game with slams, throws and crushing submissions.

Naturally, there has to be some question marks around his cardio and chin – right now, nobody appears to have tested either – but he’s clearly an A+ athlete who appears to fight a bit like a smaller version of a fellow wrestling Olympic medallist in Yoel Romero.

Belluardo – who has an equally strange nickname, ‘Caterpillar’ – is an Italian fighter who made his debut on the last occasion the UFC visited Scandinavia, the Fight Night show from Sweden in May. Belluardo looked good in the opening round of his fight against Joel Alvarez, but suffered a TKO loss when he was put on his back and hit with some big shots.

His highlight reel shows a fighter who’s a decent striker with solid fundamentals and some good power, but he’s also clearly not an athlete on the same level as Madsen and appears substantially slower than the Dane, too.

The fact that Alvarez was easily able to pass his guard and pound him out becomes more worrying when you consider that Madsen can probably dump him to the ground with relative ease.

If Madsen’s chin turns out to be weak then I could be horribly wrong here, but I just don’t see the Danish wrestler having any issues here. He’s up against a below-par athlete (in comparison to himself) who showed a notable weakness from his back in his previous fight. Assuming he doesn’t suffer Octagon shock I think he’ll throw Belluardo onto his back and TKO him shortly after.

The Pick: Madsen via first round TKO