Frans Mlambo made weight earlier today ahead of his second professional fight, taking place on January 8th in Tokyo, Japan. A product of SBG Ireland and team representative for Bahrain’s KHK MMA, Mlambo takes on China’s Changxin Fu tomorrow under the banner of Japanese promotion WMA. Ahead of Mlambo’s Japanese outing, IMMAF.org asked SBG Ireland coach and Irish Amateur Pankration Association (IAPA) President, John Kavanagh, to summarise the gold medallist’s potential. In a recent interview coach Kavanagh explained his philosophy of endorsing light and technical training with low impact sparring, and highlighted Mlambo’s ability to spar exceptionally, even with the likes of SBG teammate and UFC featherweight champion Conor McGregor. “For the few times that we do step it up in training, Frans’ technical ability in boxing means he’s able to safely spar without getting hurt,” Kavanagh explained. “I think a skill that boxers learn early on is how to spar in a realistic manner without hurting each other, whereas guys from other martial arts trying MMA for the first time don’t really understand that, or at least it takes them a longer time to learn it, so when they spar with smaller gloves it can easily escalate into non technical brawling. You just have to watch the likes of Robbie Lawler (UFC welterweight champion) talking about his early days of training and every gym sparring session was worse than any fight he had. “So that’s one huge benefit for the guys from an amateur boxing background. Mlambo has had a number of amateur boxing bouts, but he’s just genetically gifted as well. He’s got exceptional reflexes and the ability to move out the way of things. He has a good read on striking that not everybody can get, even if they’re training for a long time.” Mlambo followed up on his amateur credentials by marking himself as one of Ireland’s most exciting prospects in his home town professional debut at “BAMMA 22: Duquesnoy vs. Loughnane” in Dublin. Mlambo’s impactful performance saw him make light work of previously unbeaten Darren O’Gorman, who is an Irish prospect in his own right. Mlambo is steadily progressing through the early stages of his professional MMA career, and Kavanagh firmly believes that he is his already of a quality to compete with current UFC veterans ranked below the top 20. Kavanagh feels that continued dedication from his fighter could see Mlambo go all the way. “I’ve absolutely no doubt that if Frans stays training, he’s already at a level where he could compete in the UFC with those guys who are outside the top 20. He really is something special. In his first pro fight, the guy he fought was no joke, 3-0 at the time, a very tough Irish guy with a lot of experience and, well watch the fight, it was a first round knockout. Frans just seems able to do that to everyone he fights. I believe he has a lot of potential and I’ll be very excited to see how far he goes.” Mlambo finished his amateur career with a sweep of four victories to claim the IMMAF 145lb gold medal last July at the 2015 IMMAF Amateur World Championships in Las Vegas, USA. Written by IMMAF.org lead writer and website manager, Jorden Curran]]>
