Fabian Edwards returned to the win column this Friday with a big win over Aaron Jeffery at Bellator Belfast, re-earning him a second shot at the Bellator middleweight title.
Fabian Edwards suffered a brutal knockout defeat to the Bellator middleweight champion, Johnny Eblen, in his last outing, with at Bellator Belfast on Friday guaranteeing him a rematch with the undefeated champion.
Aaron Jeffery was coming into the bout off the back of an impressive win over Dalton Rosta, with the Canadian hoping he could earn his first crack at championship gold.
After a largely controlling first round for Jeffery, it seemed as though this fight was going to go one way and that Jeffery would use his wrestling to pick up the win. Despite that, Edwards bounced back in round two, scoring more damage with some hellacious elbows, edging the second five minutes on the cards.
Heading into round three, both fighters knew they needed a convincing round to secure the next title shot. Again the striking of the Brummy prevailed, and after a few more sharp elbows and solid straight lefts, the judges deemed him to have won two of the three rounds.
Fabian Edwards wants Johnny Eblen in London or Japan
Following the fight, the 31-year-old told the media that he could make the turnaround within a week to fight ‘Pressure’ Eblen, and listed London and Japan as his two ideal destinations for the fight.
The promotion is returning to the UK capital, London, on September 14th, with that being the most likely date for the middleweight rematch.
“If Bellator turned around and said let’s go next week, I’d say let’s go next week then. I’m ready for my rematch and I feel like I’ve been ready since my last fight with him, I feel like I’ve grown a lot and I needed a fight like that tonight, I need a fight that was going to grind and push me and I’m happy it went three rounds.
“I wouldn’t mind London then Japan. I’ve never been to Japan before so why not go to London and then two months later, go to Japan. I’d be up for that I want to be active.” Edwards said.
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The promotion announced a few days ago, that their final event of the year will take place in Japan, on December 31st.
Edwards’ first meeting with Eblen
The two middleweights last met at Bellator 299 in Dublin, Ireland, when Eblen starched Edwards with a frightening knockout.
Since then, Eblen has gone on to beat PFL 2023 light heavyweight champion, Impa Kasanganay, maintaining his undefeated record. Edwards admitted that he was ‘happy’ to see Eblen win that fight, because he still wants him to be undefeated when they meet again, because it adds to the Brit’s story.
In their first meeting, Edwards had a lot of success in the fight, and it seemed as though he was turning the tide of the fight after a strong second round. In the second round, he landed an elbow which caused an extremely deep cut above Eblen’s eye, a cut which could’ve been bad enough for the fight to have been stopped.
Despite that, the 32-year-old champion didn’t give the ref nor the doctor enough time to step in to check the cut, as 21 seconds into round three, he landed a huge shot that folded Edwards, handing him his first KO loss.
During the excitement of scoring the knockout, Eblen stood over Edwards’ unconscious body, seemingly hurling words of abuse at him. Fabian’s head coach, Dave Lovell, later accused Eblen of spitting on Edwards when he was stood over him.
The first meeting between the two and the aftermath make for a highly anticipated middleweight rematch, as Edwards looks to take the ATT product’s undefeated record.
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