This Saturday there will be a nice lead in to the UFC on FOX 9 event, as BAMMA puts on an interesting card from Birmingham, England which will air live on AXS TV. With well-known fighters like Paul Daley, Jim Wallhead and Colin Fletcher on the event along with prospects like Mansour Barnaoui and Max Nunes, there are many storylines to follow here. Today, MMA oddsmaker Nick Kalikas opened the betting lines for BAMMA 14 at Several Bookmakers. Take a look: ——————– Paul Daley -380 Romario Manoel da Silva +260 BAMMA Lightweight Title Mansour Barnaoui -130 Colin Fletcher -110 Max Nunes -260 Ion Pascu +180 Jim Wallhead -350 Florent Betorangal +250 ——————– Brad’s Analysis: Pretty much what you’d expect out of a set of lines for BAMMA. The well-known UK vets Paul Daley and Jim Wallhead are healthy favorites against fighters who have been brought in to lose to them. However, both fighters seem to be on the downside of their career, as Daley lost to Alexander Yakolev and Wallhead lost to Eddie Ellis in their last fights. It’s hard to back either guy with the current juice you’d have to lay, but they do have favorable fights. Even though it will go down as the co-main event, the lightweight title bout is by far the star of this show. Barnaoui has looked much improved of late, and already has a victory over one UFC veteran in 2013. He looks to pick up another against Fletcher, who rebounded from two UFC losses to defeat Tim Newman back in September. This will be interesting, as Fletcher doesn’t have his normally enormous height and length advantage over the six-foot champion. I do like the champion to retain here with a bit of a superior wrestling and top control game, although we know that Fletcher’s grappling is his most dangerous asset. The other fighter who is being thrown a bit of a softball is Max Nunes, coming off a performance that saw his hype train come screeching to a halt. Nunes should have a size advantage against Ion Pascu and his offensive skills cannot be understated. It’s his defensive abilities, cardio and desire that are the concerns moving forward. When a prospect like Nunes takes his first loss, it’s always interesting to see how they bounce back, and that’s the story with Nunes here. Until he shows that he’s back to where he was prior to that fight, I can’t trust him with my money, but also can’t bet against him in a fight he should win.
