These are both older guys who can be dangerous and have well rounded skills. I was surprised to see that there was a 2-1 favorite in this fight. In my mind this was close. We had a technical striker in Ponzinibbio and the in and out striking of Salikhov. Muslim has the wrestling but Ponzinibbio is a very good grappler himself. I am picking Ponzinibbio here because I do think he will own the striking exchanges and if this fight goes long, we likely see Muslim fade.

Santiago Ponzinibbio

Santiago Ponzinibbio is a very good striker who likes to stay out of the pocket. His striking is clean and he does a great job managing range really well. He doesn't have a ton of raw power but he has great volume and works TKO's because of that volume and pressure. He is coming off the loss to Kevin Holland where he was aggressive and head hunting but Kevin ended up with the finish.

Muslim Salikhov

Muslim Salikhov is a solid striker who hits very hard and has wrestling in his back pocket if he needs it. He holds nothing back and almost every single strike is a signifigant strike. He has really good takedown defense, solid takedown offense and great striking. He is coming off the early KO loss to Randy Brown to make it 2 fight skid.