UFC On ABC 8 Bonus Awards

Following yesterday’s UFC On ABC 8 event the recipients of the evening’s bonus awards were announced.

The event featured just two finishes in total across a total of 12 fights, and that led to the UFC deciding to double up on the bonuses for just one of those bouts – an absolute barnburner between Nazim Sadykhov and Nikolas Motta, who now return home from Azerbaijan with $100,000 bonuses each.

It was Motta who first brought this main card scrap to life as he suddenly decided to ramp up the pressure during the first round and unleashed a relentless barrage of punches close to the cage as Sadykhov was forced to just cover up and try to roll with the punches. There was only so much he could take though before sinking to the canvas, but he got back up again, only to come under fire again as Motta went all-out for a finish.

Sadykhov had defended himself successfully enough to survive though and then it was his turn to go on the offensive, even managing to land a head kick as he backed up the now tired looking Motta with strikes towards the end of the round.

Sadykhov continued to build on that momentum in the second round as he stalked Motta and opened up a cut to his head with a good elbow strike. More blows landed, but Motta had no quit in him and continued to do his best to fight back. Sadykhov was dialled-in at this stage though and kept finding a home for his strikes, until he eventually managed to put together a blistering combination, including two big hooks, to sink Motta to the canvas and claim a well-earned TKO victory.