Paddy Pimblett and two other UFC stars watch on as Liverpool prospects light up Cage Warriors

Next Generation MMA Liverpool had seven fighters competing Cage Warriors 160 took place in Bowler’s Exhibition Centre in Manchester on Friday.

An electric atmosphere led to some amazing fights in the building as Adam Cullen and Luke Riley stole the show with impressive victories, with the latter putting on one of the best fights of the year and solidifying himself as the promotion’s most entertaining fighter. Former Middleweight champion Matthew Bonner also continued his winning ways as Next Gen dominated the card.

Riley vs Alexander Loof was an exciting one at featherweight going into the night that saw two undefeated prospects going into the cage to take someone’s zero away from their record.

Loof was coming from Sweden for this fight so there was huge pressure on both competitors.

The first round was intensely back and forth, Loof landed big hits in the first few minutes but Riley dropped him against the cage with a huge one at the end and Loof was saved by the bell during a flurry of strikes.

Round two was one of the most intense rounds of MMA action you can see this year. The total slugfest began with a huge straight from Loof that sat Riley down and forced him to defend submission attempts for the next two minutes before getting back to his feet. The Swede was clearly exhausted after the grappling exchange which gave the advantage to Riley as he finished landing fast and powerful combos that his opponent could not counter and it was clear the fight IQ and gas tank would prove to the advantage of the unstoppable Scouser.

The third round opened with Riley continuing the clean combos and not allowing Loof’s stamina to recover at all as this fight was stopped after 58 seconds and the huge hometown crowd erupted in