Chael Sonnen vs. Anderson Silva
After talking a whole load of trash prior to their first title fight at UFC 117 in 2010, Chael Sonnen surprised a lot of people by backing up his words with action as he outwrestled the dominant champion Anderson Silva for the best part of five rounds before having his title hopes dashed when he was caught in a fight-ending submission.
He had performed well enough that he eventually earned a rematch in 2012, and in the first round he picked up where he’d left off two years earlier as he again used his wrestling to dominate the action.
It seemed that Sonnen had found the blueprint to beat Silva, which made it all the more bizarre that in the second round, ‘The American Gangster’ suddenly decided to take a leaf out if his rival’s book by going for a sudden, unexpected eye-catching move.
After a failed takedown attempt, Sonnen threw a jab and then followed up immediately behind it with a spinning backfist.
The only problem was that Silva saw it coming from a mile away and was able to bob and weave underneath it, leaving Sonnen not only swinging wildly at thin air, but also then clumsily losing his balance and falling head-first into the cage on his way down to the mat.
Silva wasted no time in seizing the moment, unleashing vicious ground and pound to stop the grounded Sonnen by TKO.
