Carnage Media

By Clayton Skulina

Electric.

That’s the first word that pops into my head when talking about Oktagon MMA’s show that took place in Frankfurt, Germany, on September 20th. From the first bell to the return of a legend in the main event, the Frankfurt fans showed up and showed out. German MMA is on the rise, and that was very evident throughout this show. Oktagon once again managed to put on a spectacle of a show, and I’m truly blessed to be able to bring this experience to you.

Oktagon 76 took place at Festhalle in Frankfurt, a venue typically used for concerts, which has hosted artists such as Mr. Worldwide himself, Pitbull. I could drive to this show, and arrived in Frankfurt about an hour and a half before the gates opened. At first, it didn’t appear to be too lively in the city – I didn’t see nearly as many fans as I had in Hamburg before the show. But as I got closer to the arena, it became very apparent what was going on- thousands of fans were lined up and ready to enter the arena. I saw lots of Oktagon shirts, UFC memorabilia, and a whole lot of support for the German king of MMA, Christian Eckerlin (for more on Eckerlin, go check out the first Carnage Cageside). 

I made my way to the press entrance, and chatted with a couple other journalists I met at the previous show I worked at as we made our way to the third floor to get set up in the press room. I took some time before the start of the event to check out the arena, and was very impressed with the setup Oktagon had, from the cage itself to the professionalism displayed by arena staff pre-event. Christian Eckerlin was part of the pre-event show, with the desk being just feet away from where I was sitting, which was extremely cool. After making my way back to the press area, the first bell rang and Oktagon 76 got underway.

After three straight unanimous decisions, 2 straight fights ended via rear naked choke. Despite this, I felt like the crowd was losing energy. No fights had any spectacular moments, and the people of Frankfurt were waiting for their big moment. Then the main card started off with one of the best knockouts of the year when German kickboxing prospect Alina Dalaslan (3-0) knocked out Clara Ricignuolo (3-4) with a spinning back elbow in the second round, causing the arena to erupt in support of their countrywoman. This knockout was one of the craziest I’ve ever seen in person (watch it here) and I truly believe that come December, it will be on the list for Oktagon’s knockout of the year. This fight was followed by Czech product Peter Gabel (7-4) taking on loudmouthed Denis “The Menace” Frimpong (7-2), who was born in Cameroon but now fights out of Dublin, Ireland. There was a lot of animosity surrounding this fight, with both fighters scoring multiple verbal jabs leading into this fight. Frimpong had my favorite walkout of the night, hitting ping pong balls into the crowd to play on a comment made by Gabel. Going into the third round, the fight was even (Oktagon has open scoring- interesting touch), but Frimpong put on a striking clinic to put away Gabel via strikes. I caught up with Frimpong after the fight, and he had a difficult time walking afterwards due to the damage he sustained. He called out all the top lightweights, and mentioned wanting the winner of Richie Smullen vs Ivan Buchinger, which takes place October 4th. 

The co-main event featured Brazilian Fabio Moraes (7-2) against undefeated German prospect Frederic Vosgrone (5-0), who made his Oktagon debut earlier this year. Vosgrone, who’s been called a Paddy Pimblet/Brock Lesnar look alike, has a very strong grappling background and is likely to make some noise in the light heavyweight division very soon. The crowd was loud during his walkout, but exploded when he utilized his offensive wrestling to stop the overmatched Moraes via strikes in the first round. 

Then it was time for the main event. This show was designed by the return of 40 year old Frankfurt native and two time Bellator title Challenger Daniel Wiechel (43-15) making his return to MMA against Frenchman Abou Tounkara (12-7). Wiechel, who’s resume includes names such as Patricio Pitbull, Paul Daley, and Dan Hardy, was missing one thing throughout his 58 (which is absolutely incredible itself) professional fights- a fight in his native Frankfurt. And man, did those fans show up! 10,000 plus of the German faithful cheered him on as he made his return, and watched him dominate all three rounds en route to a unanimous decision, allowing the Frankfurt crowd to go home happy.

However, the most shocking moment of the night happened after the fights had ended. After a fairly normal press conference (although I did enjoy the antics of Denis Frimpong),  Frederic Vosgrone stormed out after accusing Oktagon of poor treatment, with one of the members of his camp retrieving a planted microphone capturing the audio. This was later attributed to a miscommunication about security policy at the event, and Oktagon denied any wrongdoing. Vosgrone is still expected to compete October 17th at their show in Cologne (headlined by Christian Eckerlin), so we will see where the story develops from there.

So what did I think of this show? I waited a few days after the event to really think about how I wanted to phrase it, and honestly, like the first one, I thoroughly enjoyed the connection the crowd had to the top of the card. Oktagon does an excellent job at making the audience feel a connection to fighters and their home countries, which is something I haven’t experienced anywhere quite like that. I’ll be at the show in Cologne in a few weeks, and I’m curious to see how the crowd reacts when Christian Eckerlin takes the cage once again.

A big thank you to Scott Langdon and the entire Oktagon staff for their professionalism and accommodation to me, and I look forward to being in attendance for Oktagon 78 in a few weeks. See you all then!