Great news for fans of the super-heavyweight division, who have a lot to celebrate with Fight 2 Win’s latest headline. The famous submission-only promotion has announced a duel between 2019 World Champ Nicholas Meregali and 2017s World Champ Erberth Santos – the Bad Boy of jiu-jitsu. The match will take place on November 2 at F2W 130 in Denver, Colorado.
Erberth and Meregali have met before, at Copa Podio’s Argentina card back in 2016, which Santos took by kneebar from 50-50 guard. Back then Nicholas was a rising star in the brown belt division and Erberth the big star, but the two have taken very different paths since then. Over the past few years, Meregali’s status has been raised from promising youngster to one of the best gi athletes of a generation, while Santos has gone from the most feared and violent competitor on the professional division to a man struggling with panic attacks midway through his matches, giving up for no apparent reason.
Erberth’s psychological problems started back in 2018, and he has not been the same since, running hot and cold for the most part once these anxiety incidents started. This year alone Santos has had two strange episodes; The first at the BJJ Stars event in São Paulo – Brazil, where he faced Felipe Pena. The match ended after Erberth assaulted a member of the public midway through the bout. This sad performance was followed by an odd verbal tap against Australian black belt Anton Minenko at the UAEJJF World Pro.
After these two odd performances, Erberth has returned to the mats, beating Gutemberg Pereira in a great match and winning the CBJJE Mundial tournament, where he faced a couple of tough competitors and came out the victor. If Santos shows up with the right frame of mind, this match might very well be one of the best we will see this year.
