Spectacular striking skills led to another win this weekend for “Starboy.”
Sixth-ranked flyweight contender Manel Kape scored his biggest victory yet on Saturday evening, out-landing Kazakhstan’s Asu Almabayev until a finish emerged in the third round of their main event matchup. The performance from Kape closed out a UFC “Fight Night” card from the APEX in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA.
Much like he has done many times before, Saturday’s main event saw Kape show incredible speed and accuracy with his punches, making the contest a one-sided affair until its inevitable finish.
Kape pulled ahead during an impressive opening frame, charging forward with combinations that connected on Almabayev. While never in significant danger, Almabayev struggled to find an answer to the Angolan’s output and started to wear some bruising from the clean shots.
Struggling in his performance, Almabayev attempted numerous times to take Kape to the ground and avoid the dominant striking exchanges. However, Kape successfully defended the takedown shots and was able to punish Almabayev in sprawl positions at times.
Almabayev started to open up with more strikes of his own later in the second round. However, what he landed did little to bring him back into a fight where Kape was pushing the pace and putting him in trouble.
In the final minutes before the finishing sequence, Almabayev dealt not only with a tough opponent but also two instances where he was potentially on the wrong side of disputed officiating calls.
Both late in the second round and early in the third, Almabayev attempted to pause the fight after taking a finger to his left eye. Slow-motion replays on the official broadcast showed that Almabayev received open-fist slaps from Kape in both instances.
While the first eye-poke caused a brief halt to the action, the fight was resumed after the officiating team decided Kape’s open-palm strike counted as a punch. And due to the previous incident, Almabayev was immediately denied a break after Kape’s fingers got into his eye during the third round as well.
Kape’s damaging shots eventually became too much for Almabayev by the third round. After consuming a series of punches and knees against the cage, Almabayev fled to the other side of the Octagon. With no real response to the strong output from Kape other than siding with the flight instinct instead of flight, referee Mike Beltran made the fair call to end the bout.
The victory was yet another impressive showcase for Kape, who has started to find his footing in the 125-pound division.
While numerous cancelled fights early in his UFC run meant that Kape’s career was start-and-stop at times—fighting just once in 2022 and 2023 respectively—the former RIZIN champ is now coming off a trio of appearances within eight months. Prior to his win on Saturday, Kape had put on another one-sided striking performance against Bruno Silva in December.
While currently just outside the top five, Kape believes he’s ready for a chance at flyweight champ Alexandre Pantoja.
“Who’s next? They’re gonna deny, again, my title shot? Hey Hunter [Campbell], you know I’m the best,” Kape said, talking to one of UFC’s top figures. “I just stopped a guy with 17 [fight] win streaks. Everybody was scared to fight him. You guys really thought that I’m scared to fight him because he’s a wrestler? I can wrestle, I can stand with anyone in this division.”
Kape scoring his first main event UFC win is big, although Saturday was originally planned to be even bigger for him. Months back, UFC booked Kape to face top-ranked contender Brandon Royval in the headlining spot. A win in the bout would’ve moved Kape up numerous spots in the division and given him significantly more room to argue for a title fight.
However, plans had to change after Royval withdrew from the matchup due to concussions he suffered during training.
Almabayev, who was originally scheduled to face Allan Nascimento earlier in the night, was coming in with some momentum as well. He had put together four straight UFC wins prior to this weekend, with his previous performance being a decision over Matheus Nicolau. Ranked eighth in the class, he had room to move up a couple of spots in the standings if successful against Kape.
Here’s a full look at the results from Saturday’s card:
Main Card (7:00PM EST / 4:00PM PST) (ESPN+)
Bout 10: Manel Kape def. Asu Almabayev via TKO, Strikes (RD 3, 2:16)
Bout 9: Cody Brundage def. Julian Marquez via TKO, Strikes (RD 1, 4:45)
Bout 8: Nasrat Haqparast def. Esteban Ribovics via Decision, Split
Bout 7: Hyder Amil def. William Gomis via Decision, Split
Bout 6: Sam Patterson def. Danny Barlow via TKO, Strikes (RD 1, 3:10)
Preliminary Card (4:00PM EST / 1:00PM PST) (ESPN+)
Bout 5: Mario Pinto def. Austen Lane via TKO, Strikes (RD 2, 0:39)
Bout 4: Chepe Mariscal def. Ricardo Ramos via Decision, Unanimous
Bout 3: Danny Silva def. Lucas Almeida via Decision, Split
Bout 2: JJ Aldrich def. Andrea Lee via Decision, Unanimous
Bout 1: Ramazan Temirov def. Charles Johnson via Decision, Unanimous
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