Petrosyan will face an as-yet unnamed opponent. Hopes are high that Andy ‘The Machine’ Ristie will be the one standing opposite him as fans badly want to see a rematch of their GLORY 12 NEW YORK meeting.
That fight ended with Petrosyan suffering the one and only stoppage loss of his career – in fact, only the second loss of his career and the only one that he accepts (the other, a decision lost in Thailand, he maintains was the result of a crooked promoter who deliberately gave him fouled water to drink hours before the fight).
Petrosyan is now 3-0 since that shock loss, including an April win over current K-1 MAX champion Enriko Kehl. For many kickboxing fans Petrosyan is a contender for ‘Greatest of All Time’, noted for an incredibly technical game and an “airtight” defense. The official GLORY website has Petrosyan’s record as 75-2-1 with 35 of those wins inside the distance.
He won the 2012 GLORY lightweight Grand Prix and was the 2009 and 2010 K-1 MAX tournament champion. In 2011 he was the Bloody Elbow Kickboxer of the Year and in 2012 he was awarded the same honor by Liverkick.
Part of Petrosyan’s problem in the Ristie fight was that he shattered one of his notoriously delicate hands on Ristie’s head early on. A long layoff followed, but thankfully there has been no sign of any hand issues in his three fights since.
In Petrosyan’s absence from the GLORY lightweight division, things have moved on. Davit Kiria captured the vacant title at GLORY 14 then lost it to Robin van Roosmalen at GLORY 18.
Van Roosmalen, who lost to Petrosyan in the final of GLORY’s 2012 Grand Prix, made a successful defense of the belt at GLORY 20 DUBAI earlier this year. His next challenger will be Sitthichai, but fans are also very curious to see Petrosyan re-enter the mix against champion and contender alike.
Pat ‘HD’ Barry was scheduled to form one half of GLORY 24 DENVER’s co-headline fight next month against New York/New Jersey debutant Karl Roberson, a training partner of UFC light-heavyweight and ‘Ultimate Fighter’ winner Corey Anderson.
The match was being talked of as “probably” Barry’s retirement fight, with Denver being an ideal location for that because of it is his home city. Unfortunately he has now pulled out of the fight with an injury, which has also seen Roberson removed from the card.
Wayne Barrett and Dustin Jacoby replace them in the co-headline slot in a match which co-incidentally keeping the New York/New Jersey vs. Denver angle alive: Barrett lives in the Big Apple and Jacoby lives in the Mile-High City.
This is an interesting pairing. Barrett had a very strong start in GLORY and looked to be serious contender material when he beat Joe Schilling at GLORY 12 NEW YORK, but suffered some wobble in form for various reasons and has lately found himself on a slide.
Jacoby entered GLORY via a sterling three-KO performance in a ‘Road to GLORY’ tournament but was promptly thrown to the wolves, facing experienced Europeans and internationals and suffering losses accordingly.
But the dogged Jacoby has worked hard on his kickboxing – he is a UFC veteran and comes from MMA – and at GLORY 23 LAS VEGAS he was able to stop two opponents in one night (Ariel Sepulveda, Casey Greene) to win the Middleweight Qualification Tournament and return to the early promise he showed.
Barrett has briefly flirted with contender status and Jacoby can now see a path to it. For both of them it represents a light at the end of the tunnel and that means this encounter will be a hard-fought dogfight in which victory is everything. The loser will be heartbroken, so expect both to leave it all in the ring as they go after that win.
GLORY 24 DENVER takes place Friday, October 9 at the Magness Center in Denver, Colorado and airs live in the US on Spike TV. No news yet on GLORY 25 broadcast details, but presumably the US broadcast will be via tape-delay to account for time difference.
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