Thompson vs. Till

Thompson by decision. I don't think anyone is beating wonderboy in a striking-only contest.

@shake no doubt man. Some pretty bad home cookin' in that corner of the world. Silva vs Bisping was pretty atrocious.

And I agree with your assessment Till almost certainly won't land a finisher on Wonderboy. Really Thompson only struggles against guys with a strong wrestling base. If that isn't there to keep him honest, he'l just dance around and slap the **** out of his opponent. Till is a very good kickboxer, but Thompson has seen it all in that department.

Hot Chocolate was up on the cards vs Mike Perry #NeverForget 

I like Till in this one, Wonderboy's style just kinda bothers me, he's far too content on pointfighting

Till will be too aggressive for Wonderboy, and too sharp. The only time Woodley did anything offensive he did real damage to Thompson. Truly aggressive and explosive fighters and who are insane enough like Till to fully believe in themselves but with the tools to back it up are rare. Till has alot more ways to open someone up and land than Woodley's predictable overhand right. Many strikers are tailor made for Wonderboy's technical counter game. Not big, long, rangey fighters who are fast, sharp and aggressive though, which Till is. 

* Edited at 03.25.2018, 6:09 PM ET *

A lot of that had to do with the threat of a TD. Till won't grapple Wonderboy even if he gets rocked. I see this going a lot like Wonderboy vs The Red King personally. I like Tills mindset and his youth will play a big role. But the fact remains, Till was sucking his thumb while Wonderboy was competing at a high-level. There's level to this. 

There's level to it. But sometimes the up-and-comers set new levels and run right through the older guard. Like he did already with Cowboy. Who else cut through Cowboy like that right out of the gate, fading or not?

A man as cautious as WB in his fights against Woodley is not the pinnacle of MMA for me. 

Supreme talent with the kind of killer instinct mentality few fighter really posses but that Till has is a trait of the truly elite fighters that become legends.

It's a trait that made Tyson just destroy boxers. Too intense and aggressive to handle plus real skill and power. I can't see this being Yair Rodriguez hype-train derail. Till has legit elite skills, not just show skills. Enough to take advantage of Wonderboys more cautious approach. 

* Edited at 03.25.2018, 7:18 PM ET *

Tyson also had Cus. RDA smoked Cowboy, Masvidal did as well. Wonderboy had a couple bad performances against the Champ. I get that. Lets not forget Till struggled with Dalby, regardless of injury. 1 hand Newell wouldn't struggle with Dalby even with the size advantage. How Till didn't finish Ayari i'll never know. Look at what Wonderboy did to future champ Whittaker..idgaf about Roberts weight cut for that fight, he got smoked. 

I love Tills mindset and I can't wait for this fight. But I think its too much too soon. People will throw beers at the cage when they see him smashed to bits in the corner after being TKO'd. Just my opinion. 

Cool. But finesse and point scoring and all the showy technique stuff cannot pulled off if you have a pitbull coming at non-stop who doesn't give a second.

If you watch the legendary GOAT boxer Charlie Zelenoff, he just would go buck wild and put in on people straight away. Even professional boxers would get flustered with that onslaught of pressure and look sloppy. That kind of pressure with the tool kit of Till is a challenge most fighters just will not have faced, because most fighters are way more cautious and risk averse.

I just watched a video of Till, and he actually gives that style a name. Unidentified Pressure. He uses kicks, elbows, upper-cuts, straights, hooks, non-stop. He doesn't throw a jab or a one two here and there.

He would not have faced anyone like Till, especially a Till realizing his dream in Liverpool where that place is going be insane. He isn't the most aggressive fighter, and the chances to pick of point scoring or even knock out kicks is just not going to be there because Till is always punching an moving, and WB isn't know for t/ko hands. 

We'll see though. I just don't think the gulf between them, even with the experience, is great enough to nullify Till.

and Till has never fought anybody like Wonderboy. The bums he was fighting in Brazil don't even have records. 

Bulls scare people with their charges too..except for Matadors. 

You can see savagery in people from the very beginning. You saw it with Tyson. You saw it in Conor when he was fighting in community centres and savaging people. Till was up and coming themn, was fighting other rookies but his style was there just the same as he was when he ran through Cowboy. You can the same attack-dog style from the beginning and it isn't predictable.




To me a matador would be Woodley. Woodley vs Till, I would feel the fight could turn out very differently because Tyron's explosive power to catch Till and put the lights out. You're not going to be able to see and position properly to set up a signature head kick KO, just Edson wasn't able to with Khabid, another pressure fighter.

Wonderboy is a brilliant striker and mover, but there is nothing in his fight reel that shows he is really levels and levels above Till and will be able to matador him like Conor did to Eddie.

* Edited at 03.25.2018, 8:19 PM ET *

Khabib is a wrestler. Barboza wasn't fazed by his striking...it was the threat of the constant TD from Khabibs pressure. Till isn't going for a TD. There hasn't been a fighter that "gave or let" Stephen wheel-kick his face off, no. He finds it. 

Everybody calling Wonderboy a point fighter..he has 7 KO/TKO's to Tills 11. Only 4 more and Till was legitimately beating grocery boys. 


I remember another opponent preaching pressure. 

* Edited at 03.25.2018, 8:40 PM ET *

You don't actually understand what I meant because one, Khabib's pressure registers the same thing in the minds of his opponents, which is a threat to defend against. Just because a fighters come at you, is in your range and might throw a kick of a punch instead of take down attempt, it does't matter. Your brain is still registering threats and having to spend more time defending and being on the back foot. 

Secondly, Masvidal does not move anywhere near like Till does, nowhere near the fluidity, nowhere near the variety of attacks, no where near the same relentless pressure. Jorge said that before the fight but did not deliver until I think he put the gas on at one point knowing he was losing but it was too little too late. He was like Mike Perry in his last fight. Attempting to land the hand right and when he couldn't he was fairly one-dimension.

WB was one of the new generation with wider stances and better movement than more rigid pure power styles. Most of his opponents move nothing like that, and were stiff types where you could out move them and find strikes because you had better movement and longer limbs, Darren is one of the new breed that move like the lower weights, has the same long reach and physical attributes, but still retains the power of the harder styles. 

They are very similar save for WB liking his Karate kicks and Darren using a lot more tools. Wonderboy has experience but Darren has a relentless forward pressure. None of this is opinion. It's based on watching their fights and studying them. It's all there.

WB had two shots, he showed he didn't have the killer instinct needed to reach the very top and was too risk adverse to go for it and let go. Darren is obsessed, has a self-belief and simply has an aggression WB doesn't. That element is massive. Darren is not just someone with great potential for the future. He already has shown elite attributes those who have been in the game for years do not have. Eddie Alverez talked about over-thinking the game for a long time and that against Gaethje he was going back to his old self to just let go. Most fighters are trapped in the mental paralysis thing and need to let go. Till is not one of them and just lets fly.

It will be a legendary night in Liverpool. One way or the other. Maybe it really isn't his time, we'll see. 

@Bruce you know you're trying to reason with a gold-standard dip****, right? Someone who picked Conor Mcgregor to KO Mayweather within 3 rounds. He cannot go two posts without counting the ways for Mcnuggets and this morning, he probably woke up with jock full of warm goo after having an erotic dream in which Mcgregor KO'ed a Velociraptor with a spinning bird kick. And afterwards did a chanting prayer session on his hands and knees, making sure he was pointed towards Mecca (Straight blast international).

My advice; don't bother. He will reappear every so often when a UK-based fighter is having a bout, and will express no interest in MMA the other 95% of the time. He's that guy.

@De pseud

1. Citing Troll Zelenoff's jackpoting of boxers to qualify Till's pressure is stupid even by your standards. ******* hell that's idiotic. That is stupider than a Marzipan *****. The reason that these guys were caught off guard wasn't because of some innate flurrying skill possessed by charlie, it's because they thought they were entering a light sparring session and he came at them like a ******* spider monkey. That would catch anyone by surprise. When he started getting notoriety, gyms began purposely letting him in so that they could have their guys beat the **** out of him as payback.

I have to give him props for turning up to face Wilder though. I don't know if he's bat**** crazy, or as thick as two short planks,  but either way....props, Mr Zelenoff.


2: Jorge Masvidal absolutely merked Cerrone. That's who else has 'done that' to Cowboy. Nate Diaz boxed the **** out of Cowboy. RDA made pate of his liver for a TKO. If you actually watched fights that featured fighters other than those you have a hard on for (and this because they are from your corner of the world) you might actually know this stuff, and spare yourself from looking like an *******.

3: Beating Cowboy Cerrone does not a champion make. I like Cowboy, and he carries his balls around in a wheelbarrow, but he is the definitive gatekeeper. That, and by the time Till got to him, he'd already had more fights in the UFC than literally everyone else on the roster. And he's not exactly famous for fighting defensively. He's a banger. Everyone's chin declines eventually, and Till hits like a bus.

4: Savagery does not a champion make. If it did, Diego Sanchez would be the ******* GOAT.

5. Just because Thompson wins by decision doesn't mean he can't put the lights out. You do realize that he iced Robert Whittaker, the current MW champ, right? He is literally the only person to have ever managed that. Not even round 3 Yoel Romero could pull that off. Granted that didn't happen in Knuckle's optimal division, but it nonetheless happened.

He won't have faced anyone like Till? Yeah, seems improbable given he's undefeated in 57 pro kickboxing fights, and has only lost twice lost twice in MMA-- to the same guy who is a ******* wrestler, no less! Yeah. I'm sure the kickboxer with one top ten win in the UFC will completely bamboozle him.


Till could win absolutely this fight, but he should rightly be the dog going into this.

* Edited at 03.25.2018, 9:41 PM ET *

LMAO. Sit down you absolute nutter. You have a mental illness in these debates online. You act like they are some contest you have to show you superiority and dominate. Complete over-kill. And you imagine **** and make up lies and believe they are real. 

That's why I take the piss out of you. You're need to try to act like the big intellectual who knows everything. You're an absolute ******. LOL.

As if I'm ever engaging that nonsense with you, you tedious, neurotic buffoon.

* Edited at 03.25.2018, 10:05 PM ET *