Props: Tatame.com

Quoteworthy:

” … I’m fine, thanks God, I’m focused. I will fight in my weight and you know, I prefer to fight in Japan. Melvin likes striking, so my strategy is to wait him come, grab him and see what happens. I have to respect, he is a very tough guy. He’s coming from a sequence of knockouts, nice, but I’m more complete in the MMA game. Who thinks I’ll change punches with him is wrong, I’ll do my game, try to put him down and define the fight where I’m good. He’s very hard, but I believe that I beat him … what I want is win this fight. Let’s go step by step. First, I’ll face Melvin and see how it goes, try to do the right thing. The head is good, the trainings are very good and we will try to fix things.”

Brazilian jiu-jitsu phenom, Paulo Filho, talks about his preparedness for K-1 wrecking machine and mixed martial arts (MMA) veteran, Melvin Manhoef, at DREAM 10 from the Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan, on July 20. The former World Extreme Cagefighting (WEC) middleweight champion will look to return to his old form after a bizarre year, during which he battled depression and an addiction to prescription medication. Prior to slaying his personal demons outside the ring, Filho was considered among the top fighters in his category in the world inside in it, as well as certainly one of the best submission specialists in the sport. He’ll look to leverage that advantage against one helluva ferocious striker in Manhoef. It’s the quintessential “Clash of Styles” match up, but whether or not Filho can indeed still do his thing on fight night against a killer like “Marvelous” will no doubt be among the most intriguing storylines heading into the event.