Bellator 279: Cris Cyborg retains featherweight title in Hawaii

Cyborg's victory was the 26th win of her MMA career

The story below contains details of what happened at Bellator 278. You can watch the entire event again on BBC iPlayer (UK only) here later on Sunday and highlights on BBC Three from 21:00 on Sunday.

Bellator women's featherweight champion Cris Cyborg continued her dominant reign with a unanimous decision victory over Australian challenger Arlene Blencowe at Bellator 279 in Hawaii.

The bout was the second title fight contested between the pair, with Cyborg winning the first encounter in October 2020 via second-round submission.

The rematch saw the two fighters go toe to toe in a hard-fought battle as Cyborg, 36, was forced to fight all the way to the scorecards for the first time in her Bellator reign.

Cyborg dropped Blencowe, 39, at the Neal S Blaisdell Arena in Honolulu with a big right hand mid-way through the first round and appeared be on her way to a quick finish. But an illegal knee to the head of her grounded opponent forced referee Jason Herzog to pause the action and penalise the champion with a point deduction.

Despite that early setback, Cyborg went on to dominate the bout as she outstruck the durable Blencowe 141 to 67 over the five-round championship duration to register the fourth consecutive defence of her title with scores of 49-45 on all three scorecards.

After her victory, Cyborg said she was ready for the biggest challenges in the sport, and name-checked three possible match-ups she would be keen to face next, including current UFC featherweight champion Amanda Nunes and two-time Olympic judo champion and PFL lightweight champ Kayla Harrison.

"I'm just looking for the biggest fights," she said.

"I don't care if it's going to be Cat Zingano, or Amanda Nunes or Kayla Harrison. I don't know. I just want big fights for my fans."

Stots captures interim bantamweight title

In the co-main event, Raufeon 'Supa' Stots captured the interim bantamweight title and advanced to the semi-finals of the $1m Bellator bantamweight grand prix with a stunning third-round finish of former champion Juan Archuleta.

After two competitive rounds, Stots, 33, made the breakthrough in the opening seconds of round three when he connected with a head kick that dropped Archuleta to the canvas.

Stots then followed his man to the ground and connected with a salvo of heavy elbows to force referee Mike Beltran to intervene with just 16 seconds of the round elapsed.

Stots will now carry the interim title into the semi-finals of the tournament, where he will face the winner of the quarter-final between Brazil's Leandro Higo and American Danny Sabatello.

Mix eliminates former champion Horiguchi

In the night's other bantamweight grand prix bout, Patchy Mix claimed the biggest win of his career with a unanimous decision victory over former two-promotion champion Kyoji Horiguchi.

Japan's Horiguchi, 31, was looking to work his way back to the title after a stunning knockout loss to current champion Sergio Pettis last December.

But Mix, 28, arrived in Hawaii in peak form and outworked the former Bellator and Rizin bantamweight champion over the five-round duration to earn scores of 48-47 on all three scorecards and improve his record to 16 wins, one loss.

Mix will move on to the semi-finals of the tournament, where he will take on the winner of the upcoming quarter-final bout between Russia's Magomed Magomedov and Peru's Enrique Barzola.

Kish outpoints former champion

The biggest crowd reception of the night was reserved for the return of Hawaii's Ilima-Lei Macfarlane, but the former Bellator women's flyweight champion came up second best to American former UFC contender Justine Kish.

Competing in the Bellator cage for the first time since losing her title to Juliana Velasquez in December 2020, Macfarlane, 32, was outworked by Kish, who outstruck her opponent on the feet, and did well to avoid serious trouble when the action went to the canvas.

The judges scored the bout 30-27, 29-28, 29-28 for 34-year-old Kish, who snapped a three-fight losing streak to claim her first victory inside the Bellator cage in her second appearance for the promotion.

Medeiros makes crowd-pleasing debut

In the opening main card bout of the night, former UFC featherweight Yancy Medeiros made his Bellator debut in style with a thrilling unanimous decision victory over long-time contender Emmanuel Sanchez.

In his first fight at home in Hawaii for 13 years, Medeiros claimed scores of 29-28, 30-27, 30-27 from the judges after a back-and-forth battle with Sanchez that had the crowd on their feet throughout.

Medeiros' victory also snapped his four-fight losing streak as he improved his career record to 16 wins, eight losses.