Russian veteran Milana Dudieva earned a close decision victory in her long-awaited Octagon debut tonight at UFC Fight Night 48: “Bisping vs Le” in Cotai, Macau. The powerful judoka narrowly outpointed American prospect Elizabeth Phillips in a bantamweight bout on tonight’s preliminary card.
As she often does, Dudieva gave up top position repeatedly in scrambles on the ground, but she stayed active from her back with submission attempts. Phillips landed minimal ground and pound throughout the fight and she was punished for her perceived passivity by two of the three cageside judges.
Dudieva (11-3-0) looked to land haymaker right hands early in the fight and Phillips (4-3-0) wisely kept her distance. She picked her shots with jabs and leg kicks and circled to the right to avoid Dudieva’s power hand. Dudieva rushed in with a flurry that landed and she tried to throw Phillips to the mat, but Phillips stayed on her feet. She attempted a standing guillotine choke, but Dudieva took her down and transitioned to back control. Phillips turned into her guard and fought off an armbar and a kneebar. She finished the round on top and landed short right hands.
The second round began slowly and Phillips once again jabbed and stayed on the outside. Dudieva pressed forward with another combination and she threw Phillips to the mat. Phillips stood against the cage and Dudieva dragged her back down with a bulldog choke. In an ensuing scramble, Phillips wound up on top, but Dudieva quickly looked for an armbar and a triangle choke from her back. The fighters exchanged punches on the ground in the final 40 seconds.
Phillips took Dudieva’s back early in round three, but Dudieva turned into the clinch and landed a knee in close. She tripped Phillips and immediately gave up top position in a scramble. Phillips avoided a triangle choke attempt and spent the remainder of the uneventful round on top in side control. She was warned multiple times for timidity, but did finish the round with some short right hands and elbows.
In spite of Phillips’s top control on the ground, two judges favoured Dudieva’s punching flurries on the feet and submission attempts. The Russian fighter walked away with a close Split Decision victory, while Phillips was left in a state of disbelief. Dudieva remains unbeaten in three fights this year.
Winner: Milana Dudieva by Split Decision (30-27, 29-28, 28-29) after three rounds. She improves to 11-3-0.
(Photo Credit: ProFC)
Dudieva will have a rough road in the UFC, if she doesn’t change certain things in her game.
She will definitely have issues with people like McMann, Miesha Tate, Amanda Nunes, Cat Zingano, Alexis Davis etc.
And, although she was more calculated this time, once again, she looked quite gassed in the 3rd round…
Thanks Rafael, I didn’t see the fight myself. Very interesting. I wonder if Phillips will face some penalty from the UFC for her Twitter outburst immediately after the fight, perhaps even be cut? That would be a shame — I’m not saying that she shouldn’t be cut, because that was a very very nasty tweet. But still a shame as I think Elizabeth has tremendous potential and just made things needlessly difficult for herself.
You know, Andy, the outcome was far from a robbery. Dudieva was winning the standup battle (Phillips’ striking is quite clumsy, if you ask me…), but there wasn’t many exchanges. She took Phillips down all three rounds, but wound out being reversed all the times. She can’t keep top position. In round 1, it was really fast.
In round 3, Phillips laid on top of Dudieva for nearly 2 minutes and didn’t land anything… so, she honestly shouldn’t complain.
But Dudieva’s game is full of holes and she got some work to do herself.
Wow, I’ve never seen Dudieva fight, but this gives great insight. Plus Phillips may be in some trouble with the UFC. If she didn’t have a really good reason to complain about the decision, the UFC cannot let fighters go off like that and criticize an entire country (Russia) and go unpunished. There’s a good chance she will be let go, if for no other reason — to send a message to other fighters that they can’t do that.
Quick question Rafael – if you have FightPass, how do you like it? I will most probably subscribe to it to watch Invicta FC 8 – but if I want to opt out after a month, do you think it will be a problem? Thanks a lot
At the beginning of each round Phillips had to be reminded by the ref to fight. She was so afraid of Dudievas overhand right that she was wasting the first minute and a half running from Dudieva. Only when the referee repeatedly screamed “come on fight” did Phillips attempt to engage. This is the reason Dana White thought Dudieva squeaked out the win. Dudieva maintained the upper hand as far as agressiveness goes throughout the entire fight.
Phillips deserves to be in the UFC but she is a bottom tier fighter. She is worlds away from someone like Rousey…as is her overrated training partner, Julianna Pena. Pena will get crushed when she returns. She beat a 37 year old 125er with no ground game that got beat by a 115er, Fellice Herrig. Pena and Phillips should go back to King of the Cage.
Really interesting stuff Mike – I was wondering why Dana thought Dudieva won that fight. Make total sense now. The thing that surprised me about Pena was the fairly easy TUF win against Baszler, and then a similar TUF performance in avenging her loss to Moras. I think Pena has some wrestling ability and she seems very strong. I’m not her biggest fan, but it still was a real shame what happened to her knee.
I’m still waiting to see how the UFC handles Phillips’ tweet. Could be with all the flap over White’s dismissing that Hughes judge, and now formally apologizing for it — maybe the UFC will just let this whole Phillips tweet thing blow over and just hope it all goes away.
What i really want to see is Shayna Bazler kick the shit out of Correia and then rematch Pena. If Shayna fights both girls like she fought McMann she will win. If you watch the McMann-Bazler fight it kind of reminds me of the way Dillashaw took out Barao (even though Shayna lost by a hair)
I hope she has been working those toe holds, ankle locks, and knee bars. She had Cyborg in a knee bar/ankle lock that almost suceeded until Cyborg broke free and kicked her ass.
Shayna should win those two and retire to beer drinking and MMA coaching. Her story will then be complete.
Right with you on Shayna Mike – seems everybody rags on Shayna these days – they rag on her skills and her personality, and I don’t know why. I love her and think she’s great for the sport. I think people just take her too seriously – she’s just playing a character of herself for heaven’s sake! Once people realize this, they’ll see that Shayna’s actually very entertaining and very smart. Yes it’s a little WWE style, but that’s fine – the fighting’s still completely real!! I think Shayna will surprise more than a few people tomorrow (Saturday Aug 30th) — she’ll break into the top 10 and from there the sky’s the limit.
She looked good in the first round but couldn’t stay away from correia like she did against McMann on the feet. I feel so sorry for her.
And can you believe how fuckin retarded Pena and her supporters are…they think that by denegrating Shayna’s skills it makes Pena look better. Does she not realize that you always should strive to build up the fighters you beat…that way it makes your victory appear that much better…but what do you expect from a retard like Pena. She is so desperate to keep herself relevant. And you got that other idiot from Sikjitsu (Chiesia) claiming that if Correia is ranked 10th then Pena should be ranked 5th. How the fuck does that make sense. Bazler dominated both Pena and Correia in the first round and got beat in the second by both. Neither one of these two idiots could have graduated from 10th grade if they cannot see how illogical that statement is! Plain stupid!!
The should let Rousey fight both Correia and Pena on the same night…and submit them both.!
Pena is so pissed off that Dana wouldn’t fly her out to Sac Town for 177. She missed another chance to secretly bang her douchbag boyfriend, Matt Hughes. You mark my word…Pena is such a wreckless piece of shit fighter that she will either lose her ass off or stay injured her whole short career. The most overrated Tuf winner in history. Fuckin fake lying bitch told Dana White that a Heavyweight jumped her in the gym…the guy weighed less than her…josh gow fights at flyweight.