Academy South East #40 – RESULTS

Highlight-reel knockouts, thrilling title fights and some sensational submissions were the order of the night as Cage Warriors Academy South East held their 40th show in Colchester last night.

The promotion has a long history of finding and featuring the future stars of the sport, with numerous fighters having started their fistic careers at the academy before going on to excel with the world’s biggest promotions. And if their 40th show at the Charter Hall was anything to go by, there are many more fledgling academy talents ready to take their next steps towards stardom.

In the main event, Jacob Gifford defended his amateur featherweight title with a first round rear naked choke finish of the in-form Marcin Kochel. Gifford, of the talent-laden GB Top Team, wasted little time in taking Thetford’s Kochell to the floor and sinking in the finish to move to 7-2.

In the co-main, home favourite Ben Edwards lost his amateur welterweight crown to challenger Dorian Steele in a high-level fight between two very well-matched athletes. Steele won his seventh straight fight to move to 7-2 and lift the belt on a split decision, while BKK Fighters product Edwards dropped to 9-2-1 . It’s a fight we’ll hopefully get to see again soon.

Meanwhile, Lilian Pavlache, from Brentwood’s SXMMA, put on an absolute clinic to lift the amateur bantamweight title, completely neutralising the usually effective grappling of foe Dacre Bradley en route to a dominant points win. Pavalache, now 4-1, bossed every aspect of the fight from start to finish, displaying his trademark powerful striking coupled with superb counter-grappling and impressive strength to cruise to a statement win.

Elsewhere, champ Karle Mullings continued his reign of terror at light-heavyweight, intelligently and patiently picked apart foe Douglas Saunders before unleashing the heavy artillery he’s known for to force the TKO finish inside the first round and retain his gold. Force MMA prospect Mullings is now 6-0, with all but one of those wins coming by stoppage, and very much looks like one of those aforementioned future stars.

In the other title fights on the card, Uri Fraser dominated Mani Odoucha to move to 5-1 and collect the amateur super-lightweight title on a wide points decision. And Habid Samadi secured takedowns at key times to edge out the entertaining Michael Fong Song in their amateur flyweight title dispute. Samadi, of London MMA Warriors, moves to 4-0 after the unanimous decision win.

There were highlight-reel finishes littering the card, with Masoud Habibi’s concussive first round stoppage of Latif Cocka probably the pick of the bunch in terms of KO of the night.

Just seconds after being docked a point for holding the fence, Habibi uncorked a bomb of a right hand to usher Cocka into the realms of the unconscious.

There were big KO’s too for Siyovush Davlatov in the first fight of the night, another seismic right hand stoppage in the first round against Mattia Miceli, while Alexander Ephson scored a standing KO win against Massimo Riva, also in the first. In terms of submissions, Luca Ciobanu’s violent second round kimura win over Albert Brooks was both brutal and beautiful.

And SXMMA’s Elvis Isaacs also scored a notable sub when he apparently put foe Alex Shaw to sleep with a triangle, while Elliot Osamuede tapped Milan Moczo with a ninja choke in another impressive win.

Cage Warriors Academy returns to the Charter Hall on April 18, 2026.

By Mark Heath

www.eadt.co.uk