Young MMA stars will takes Springs far

This comes after two of his Springs’ mixed martial arts fighters, who competed in Fightstar22, came home victorious on Saturday evening.

Gift Walker and Nathaniel Komane both won their fights with Orlando Mashaba’s fight being cancelled.

Marcel Els lost to his opponent, Stephen Goncalves, by a technical knock out (TKO) in the first round.

He says of his fight: “I’d like to congratulate my opponent, Stephen, he did very well in the fight and his hard work paid off.

“I am disappointed about the loss but we all learn out of everything and I learnt a lot out of this one.

“There are no excuses for losing but we know now what we need to fix and hopefully you’ll see me back in the cage as a new man and a new fighter.

• Read: Marcel wins his first pro fight

“I’m excited to see what the future holds.”

Fighting on the amateur circuit, both Gift and Nathaniel were excited about their wins.

Gift won by TKO using a guillotine in the 39th second of the second round.

He says his junior (16 to 18 years) amateur debut against Righard Burger went very well.

“Righard came out strong but I knew that all my hard work would pay off and I could win the fight.”

He comments that he was pretty calm throughout, “I wasn’t as nervous as I thought I would be and the atmosphere in the hall helped me focus and do what I had been trained to do.”

Gift says he is ready and prepared to get back in the ring as soon as possible.

James adds they have asked for a title fight for him but, since he has just beaten the best fighter in his age and weight group, Fightstar is unsure who to pit him against.

“I really just want to thank the team and all my friends and family for their support and Jesus for keeping me and my opponent safe.”

Originally pegged for a Bantamweight fight, Nathaniel’s fight was changed on Thursday and a new featherweight opponent was chosen for him.

James describes this fight like that of David and Goliath – “this was a man fighting a boy” – with Nathaniel (in the role of David) showing that with determination and good training anything is possible.

• Also read: Two locals to fight in EFC 51

Nathanial won 40 seconds into the second round with a ground and pound TKO against Buya Blasie.

He says “Buya swung wild and I saw it coming so I was able to duck and take him down.

“From there I walked him along the ground into my corner and TKOed him.”

He says he enjoyed the fight, “I feel really good about this fight, I just went out there and had a lot of fun.

“I want to thank the team for taking us to dark places during training so our opponents can’t take us there during our fights.

“We have a wonderful team, coaches and the best manager in James, who all helped prepare us for whatever our opponents threw at us.

“The two youngsters really impressed me and we are very excited to see what the future holds for them,” says James.

He adds Pro League will definitely be incorporating them into a development programme to help them reach a professional level if that is what they want.

“These guys are the future of MMA in SA, they are the men the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) will be talking about,” says James.

He comments on Marcel’s fight saying that he is not disappointed.

“We all share the lose as we lost together, as a team.

“We are very proud of him.

“He went out there under very tough conditions and fought a brilliant fight, showing a level sportsmanship we can all be extremely proud of.”

All three fighters train with JP Kruger at House of Tinkerbell.

JP says he is extremely proud of all of his “boys”.

“From the guys who didn’t compete, but were there to warm up their training partners, to our fighters on the night, everyone showed great team spirit and sportsmanship and made us all very proud.

“Win or lose we praise Jesus.

“Well done Gift and Nate for their amazing performances and some great wrestling.

“Marcel fought a high level fight.

“In this game there must be a winner and there must be a loser, sometimes you’re the hammer and sometimes you’re the nail and this time we were the nail.

“But we get back up there, Marcel is already back in the gym training so we will fix what needs fixing and carry on fighting.

“We are super blessed.”