The quarter-final round for OKTAGON’s Tipsport Gamechanger Middleweight Grand Prix is now half complete.
Mick Stanton and Mark Hulme secured wins on Saturday night, moving them past the year-long tournament’s round of 16. Their performances were part of OKTAGON 67, which took place at the Werk Arena in Trinec, Czech Republic.
Former Cage Warriors Middleweight Champion Stanton put together a grinding three-round performance against the Czech Republic’s own Milos Petrasek to earn his win on Saturday.
The three-round performance from Stanton saw him use control on the ground to secure a comfortable unanimous decision result.
Stanton spent a large amount of the fight’s 15 minutes in top position on the mat, allowing him to chip away against Petrasek with short strikes and briefly look for submissions at times. While Petrasek had brief moments of brilliance in the second and third rounds—reversing positions or working out of spots he was put in by Stanton—it was never enough for him to win a round on scorecards.
“I would’ve liked a stoppage, but he’s an athlete,” Stanton said in his post-fight interview. “He’s a beast, take me out of tune. But listen, I am a different level. You can boo all you want, I’m going to run through this division.”
Stanton now has back-to-back wins since joining OKTAGON last year. The long-time Cage Warriors fighter earned a finish in his debut last April, stopping Kamil Wojciechowski in the third round with strikes.
Petrasek, an OKTAGON fighter since 2018, was also riding the momentum of a win over Wojciechowski from last year.
Hulme bounced back from his unsuccessful run on last year’s season of “The Ultimate Fighter,” making quick work of 2023 Tipsport finalist Andreas Michailidis.
A clean left hook from Hulme sent Michailidis scrambling just a little over 90 seconds into their fight. After dropping Michailidis with the blow, Hulme went to the ground to throw hammerfist strikes against the rocked fighter.
While ground and pound shots didn’t earn Hulme a stoppage, he found a way to end the fight just moments later. The South African talent started to pursue a guillotine choke as they moved back to the feet, then kept a hold of the choke as they came crashing back down to the mat.
Michailidis remained in the hold until he tapped nearly halfway through the round.
The win was a big performance for Hulme, who had been out of the spotlight for nearly a year before this weekend. His last appearance occurred on Season 32 of “The Ultimate Fighter,” where he lost a first-round matchup to Paddy McCorry.
Now with a debut OKTAGON win under his belt, the former EFC Champion eyes a long run in the Tipsport Gamechanger tournament.
“I hope you guys sleep tight tonight because if I was you, I’d be shaking in my pants,” Hulme said, addressing other fighters in the 16-man middleweight bracket.
Michailidis made it to the grand finals of OKTAGON’s welterweight tournament two years ago, ultimately getting submitted in the grand finals by Bojan Velickovic. Saturday marked his third consecutive defeat in the promotion, with the tournament losses sandwiched between a 2024 defeat against former OKTAGON champ Piotr Wawrczyniak.
Hulme and Stanton now join Matej Penaz and Kerim Engizek as the few fighters who have advanced past the tournament’s first stage. Opening round fights will continue in the coming months, wrapping up at OKTAGON 70 in late April.
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