After early ‘TUF’ exit, Ben Wall returns, meets Alex Garcia at UFC Fight Night 33
Ben Wall‘s dream of a second chance with the UFC has come to fruition.
Wall (7-0-1 MMA, 0-0 UFC), who was eliminated early on “The Ultimate Fighter: The Smashes,†has signed a three-fight deal with the UFC, his manager, Wade Hampel, told MMAjunkie.
Although he didn’t divulge the fighter’s debut date, the Australian’s signing comes the week before the UFC hosts “UFC Fight Night 33: Hunt vs. Silva†at Brisbane Entertainment Centre in Queensland, Australia. According to MMAWeekly.com, Wall has agreed to step in for welterweight Andreas Stahl (9-0 MMA, 0-0 UFC) and will fight welterweight Alex Garcia (10-1 MMA, 0-0 UFC) at the show.
Their bout is expected to kick off next week’s card and stream on MMAjunkie ahead of the FOX Sports 1 and FOX Sports 2 broadcasts.
The 24-year-old Wall, who usually competes at lightweight, will get his heavily desired second shot with the world’d largest MMA promotion.
In late 2012, Wall represented his home country on “TUF: The Smashes,†which pitted Australian fighters against competitors from the U.K. In the show’s second episode, eventual show finalist Colin Fletcher eliminated Wall via two-round unanimous decision. Wall then didn’t get a fight at the show’s live finale.
“I was really disappointed,†he told MMAjunkie earlier this year. “The last couple of seasons, they’ve brought all the fighters back to fight on the finale. This time it was only a couple of guys, so I was pretty disappointed in that. I thought I would get a shot.â€
Wall instead returned to the regional scene in March and earned a unanimous-decision win over Jai Bradney at a Nitro MMA event in Queensland. He then defeated two-time UFC fighter Bernardo Magalhaes in the mixed-rules event Combat 8, which saw fighters don MMA gloves for what ultimately amounted to a boxing match that allowed for ground-fighting in just 30-second intervals.
The latest UFC Fight Night 33 card now includes:
Mark Hunt vs. Antonio Silva
Mauricio Rua vs. James Te-Huna
Ryan Bader vs. Anthony Perosh
Pat Barry vs. Soa Palelei
Dylan Andrews vs. Clint Hester
Alex Caceres vs. Mitch Gagnon
Bethe Correia vs. Julie Kedzie
Takeya Mizugaki vs. Nam Phan
Caio Magalhaes vs. Nick Ring
Justin Scoggins vs. Richie Vaculik
Krzysztof Jotko vs. Bruno Santos
Alex Garcia vs. Ben Wall
