Akhmed Aliev – The Butcher

Lightweight (FightMatrix #24, Tapology #72)

While the UFC owns the majority of the best fighters competing in most weightclasses in mixed martial arts there is no shortage of up and coming talent worldwide. In this series we hope to have a look at some of the more exciting names outside of the big leagues. There are plenty of reasons not to make it State side, after all, but the reader will quickly notice that a lot of the best names outside of the UFC and Bellator are Russian. Today we examine one such Eastern prospect, Akhmed Aliev.

Fight Nights Global (FNG) has quietly run over eighty events in Eastern Europe and Akhmed Aliev has quickly become one of their stars. Lightweight is not a division that is short on talent and FNG has their own champion, Magomedsaygid Alibekov. Independent rankings which include fighters from outside of the UFC and Bellator are in short supply but FightMatrix (which is ranked through the magic of maths) and Tapology both have Aliev significantly outranking the current FNG champ. He is also FightMatrix’s highest ranked lightweight outside of the big two promotions—a position he rocketed into after ‘defeating’ Diego Brandao in September. We will touch on that controversial bout later on but first let’s look at why Aliev might excite you.

Aliev is a first and foremost a savvy striker. Starting each fight in a high kickboxing stance, he will gradually uncoil into a wider base as he warms up and begins applying his jab. Aliev’s jab is decent—which is already pretty revolutionary in mixed martial arts—and he likes to set a couple of basic traps with it. He’ll jab at his opponent and try to skip up into the left high kick if they start parrying (a classic), and he’ll look to jab and give ground when the opponent retaliates, attempting to coax them onto a check hook. I can’t show you many good gifs of his check hook because he shows it constantly and it almost never connects—but it seems to serve as something of a deterrent to following him. Actually the one opponent it connected on was simultaneously his best regarded and wildest, Diego Brandao.

Aliev’s kicking game used to be held back by takedown concerns, but his lead leg looks dexterous and cunning when he lets it go. Occasionally he goes to an inside low kick which is fast enough that this writer would love to see more of it. Aliev seems able to get away with it but is struggling to build the confidence to use it. That caution is understandable though, the inside low kick is one which the opponent can drop right down on—Michael Bisping has been dragged down off it dozens of times throughout his career.