On March 29, Moscow will host the next tournament of the REN TV Fight Club series, which will be highlighted by the fact that perhaps Russia’s best heavyweight of recent years, Vitaly Minakov, returns to action.
This is a rather important event, and for his return the star was given an opponent in the person of the British Oli Thompson in a fight according to novel rules – boxing with MMA gloves. It is also important that Minakov sees this opportunity not only as a chance to remember himself, but also as a springboard to return to more important fights, which he was certainly missing.
The last time fans saw a fight involving Vitaly Minakov was almost two and a half years ago. The Russian heavyweight then competed in the Bellator tournament in Moscow, but disappointingly lost to Surinamese Said Souma. During the fight, in which Vitaly was winning, his finger flew off, which the referee noticed. Even though Minakov himself quickly put the finger on him, the fight was stopped and our fighter was considered defeated by technical knockout. This is Minakov’s first and only early loss in his career. And then he disappeared from sight for a long time.
The referee left Minakov without victory:
Minakov was ready to fight with a broken finger. The judge “stole” his victory
Furthermore, Bellator said that they were ready to get revenge on Minakov since he won the fight, but, as often happens, bureaucratic delays intervened. Vitaly’s main problem is the visa. His contract with Bellator is still valid, it’s just that the league does not prohibit him from performing in other organizations. Furthermore, the situation was very strange. Bellator has tournaments in Europe, but they didn’t want to put Minakov there. As the fighter himself explained, the league planned to use him specifically in tournaments in the United States, although Scott Coker said back in 2021 that Vitaly could be seen in other countries.
Fight against Vitaly Minakov
Photo: Dmitry Golubovich, “Championship”
“We will try to do everything possible to ensure that the fighters receive the necessary visas. Sometimes we manage to organize it, sometimes we don’t. Since we are expanding beyond the United States, organizing tournaments in England and planning to do so in Asia or the Middle East, this way we are going to solve the problem with Minakov so that he can return to the title race,” said the official. saying.
In fact, every conversation with Minakov about a possible fight ends with the fact that the fighter simply does not have a visa and, no matter how hard he tries, he cannot get one. In the fall of 2023, Vitaly emphasized that he was still trying to solve the problem: “All this time, together with the management, we have been trying to get a visa, but so far it has not worked. There were a couple of refusals for unknown reasons. During this break, I rested quite well physically and psychologically and there was a desire to devote a little more time to martial arts. With constant performances, the desire to play sports and hunger are suppressed, but during these two years I absolutely realized that I would like to continue. It was thought to put an end to this, because in recent years my career has been accompanied by external factors and problems: a contract, a dispute with management, a visa. Naturally, at some point you start to get tired and think: both age and indirect factors say that maybe enough is enough. I seriously thought about quitting the sport altogether; Anyway, I’m inevitably heading towards this. But over the last year and a half or two, I realized that I need it physiologically. Also, I don’t stop working on visas; I still have to try. The contract with Bellator remains. It is still unclear what prompted the denials. As far as I know from my communications with foreign managers, with Rizvan Magomedov, Bellator allows you to perform in Russia as long as these difficulties continue.
Minakov really tried to perform in local leagues, but even here he encountered failures. In the fall there was supposed to be a fight at the RCC, but in the end it did not work out, later Vitaly himself suffered a minor injury and was recovering. And the fighter refused to compete in the ASA Grand Prix because he didn’t want to commit to long-term deals.
Also, at the same time, Minakov started working where he didn’t have to beat people in a cage. He spoke about this in detail on Grigory Drozd’s podcast: “Now I work for a large international company, the En + group, to which the RUSAL company belongs.” These are energy complexes, metallurgy, aluminum production, heat generation, etc. I work with a public youth organization and deal with social issues. In general, now all our companies are located in the Irkutsk region, the Krasnoyarsk Territory and the Republic of Khakassia. The comprehensive development of the territories is underway. What is it? The development of the housing stock, we are building housing for our employees, for the residents of the city. We create favorable conditions for both. We are developing the territory. And in Siberia, as we know, the infrastructure is not particularly developed, many social facilities are missing or in a sorry state. In addition to the housing stock, kindergartens and schools are being built, landscaping works are being carried out, and sports infrastructure is being developed. The construction of 12 martial arts centers is planned and a program for the development of these centers will be developed together with local municipalities.”
Vitaly Minakov
Photo: Dmitry Golubovich, “Championship”
During all this time, Minakov does not stop trying to return to the big arena. At the moment, Bellator is under the control of the PFL, but Vitaly’s contract remains in force. He has three fights left and now the heavyweight wants to understand if he will be allowed to compete in the top league.
There was a time when Minakov was the great hope of Russian MMA, at least in the heavyweight division. He was predicted the glory of Fyodor Emelianenko, and some believed that he could surpass the Last Emperor. And Vitaly’s results favored him. He quickly came to Bellator to win the Grand Prix, then became heavyweight champion and defended the belt. Only then his career did not go the way he wanted.
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In 2014, Minakov suffered a mysterious injury that he doesn’t like to talk about. And it is assumed that they were actually heart problems. Then, becoming the Bellator champion, he stopped performing in the organization, as he considered his contract to be enslaving. For this, Vitaly was deprived of the title, but he calmly performed at Fight Nights and returned in 2018, when his new manager Ali Abdel-Aziz obtained decent conditions.
Minakov did not like the comparisons with Fedor very much from the beginning: “I know that sometimes I am compared to Fedor Emelianenko, but I think that is wrong. You can compare two fighters when they have already completed their careers and achieved some results. My career, in fact, is just beginning, although it could end at any time. “If I had held the title for four or five years, I could still be compared to a proven great fighter like Fedor.”
Fedor Emelianenko
Photo: Dmitry Golubovich, “Championship”
And then Vitaly noticed that he was only striving to reach the level of Emelianenko and be on the same level with him. Now Minakov is already 39 years old. There may be some regret left over the way his career turned out. For example, since 2018 he has had only three fights with a 1-2 record. If there had not been such downtime, then, probably, Minakov would only have established himself as the best heavyweight in Russia. However, Vitaly believes that he has fully realized himself. And who knows, maybe the fight with Oli Thompson will be a reboot for his career. Now almost all Bellator tournaments will be in Europe, so this is a chance for the Russian to remind the world about himself.
As a last resort, there is an option with Sergei Kharitonov. Minakov also talked about this possibility and finds the fight interesting. And we will be glad to have the opportunity to see Vitaly in battles.
