Lerone Murphy secures unanimous decision victory over Douglas Silva de Andrade at UFC Fight Island 8
The UFC touches down for the second fight card of their third stint of Fight Island events today, as UFC Fight Island 8 goes down live from Abu Dhabi, January, 20, 2021.
Headlining the event will be a welterweight bout between No. 8 ranked Michael Chiesa and No. 9 ranked Neil Magny. Co-headlining the event is also a welterweight bout, this one between Warlley Alves and kickboxing champion Mounir Lazzez.
Opening up the main card today was a featherweight bout between undefeated English phenom Lerone Murphy and Brazilian talent Douglas Silva de Andrade.
Murphy came into this fight with a record of 9-0-1, having gone to a draw with Zuba Tukhugov in his UFC debut, and TKO’ing Ricardo Ramos in round one of his most recent bout. De Andrade came in with a record of 26-3 (1 NC), having gone 2-2 in his last four.
This included victories over Marlon Vera and Renan Barao, and defeats to Rob Font and Petr Yan. These two have both fought some seriously elite competition.
Continue reading to see how this 145 lb match up went:
Round 1
Round one was very much a feeling out process for both parties. Murphy comes out and takes the center once the fight starts, and begins landing some nice calf kicks. He also landed a few nice right crosses to de Andrade’s body and head.
Murphy tags de Andrade with a beautiful overhand right and has him stunned momentarily, but de Andrade recovered quickly and returned with some strikes of his own.
Round 2
Murphy goes for a head kick at the start of round two, ends up in a scramble, and gets his back taken. He got out of it pretty quickly, and went right back to that calf kick, forcing de Andrade to switch his stances.
Murphy ends up pressing de Andrade against the fence, but muscled the takedown attempt and ended up on his back. He’s back to his feet quickly once again and lands a beautiful elbow on the break.
De Andrade is still pressing the action, showing his heart and skill, but is still being picked apart. He’s lunging in for most of his strikes, and while he’s landing some of them, it doesn’t seem to be enough.
Round 3
De Andrade started landing a good amount of overhand rights in round three, with Murphy still landing his own strikes. With about one minute left, Murphy presses de Andrade into the fence. Murphy secures the single leg and ends round three on top reigning down ground-and-pound
Official Result: Lerone Murphy def. Douglas Silva de Andrade via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 30-27)
