Break it Down: Norman Parke vs. Francisco Trinaldo

This weekend we will see the tenacious Northern Irishman Norman Parke face the Brazilian Francisco Trinaldo in a lightweight match up in hostile territory when the UFC visits Goiania, Goias, Brazil on the 30th of May.

Norman Parke has enjoyed a lot of success since he won the Ultimate Fighter: Smashes series back in 2012. He remained unbeaten in his first five outings as a UFC fighter but suffered a very close split decision to longstanding divisional gatekeeper Gleison Tibau in January, a bout in which it would’ve been easy to make a decent case for a decision victory for Parke. This is impressive considering that Tibau holds victories over Jeremy Stephens, Jamie Varner and even current world lightweight champion Rafael Dos Anjos.

Trinaldo has also had a successful UFC career since making his promotional debut back in 2012, with six wins and three losses so far. Despite having not achieved a KO/TKO victory in the Octagon as yet, Francisco delivers strikes with great power and has every chance of finishing the fight if his opponent gets lazy.

One of the first things that will become apparent when Trinaldo enters the cage is his sheer size. While standing only 5’8″ tall, his frame is completely filled out and has proven to be hugely athletic which plays no small part in his excellent ability to sprawl and avoid takedowns. Quite often he’ll throw a strong knee to the body of his opponent after moving his hips away from the failed takedown attempt while also making use of his significant weight advantage by leaning heavily on his opponent from the sprawl position. As somebody that doesn’t have a background in freestyle wrestling, Parke would do well to avoid shooting in for your standard double or single leg takedowns. If he is intent on taking Trinaldo down he’d be well served in deferring to his background skill set, Judo. Trinaldo’s heavily muscled frame will work to his detriment later in the fight if Parke can force the big man to grapple in the standing position for extended periods of time. He may prove hard to control in the beginning, but as Trinaldo’s muscles start to fill with lactic acid he’ll quickly become tired and Parke will be able to put his excellent Judo skills to use, bullying him against the cage and eventually taking him down.

Although there is a clear route to victory for Parke in the grappling realm, I believe that the majority of this fight will be contested on the feet. Norman has shown great improvements in his striking since his days on The Ultimate Fighter, especially with his straight punches from the southpaw position. In particular his lead right jab has proved very effective against slower strikers and he often follows it up with a rangey and powerful left cross, which he used to great effect in his win over Naoyuki Kotani in Dublin in July of last year. In his last fight against Gleison Tibau, Parke displayed a new wrinkle in his game in regularly throwing a front leg roundhouse kick to the face. This was likely something that he’d developed in training camp and was intended to work specifically against the southpaw Tibau, as the kick is more effective from that side due to the fact that the shoulder cannot be used to protect the face and the strike must be blocked with the forearm, which hurts like hell. It’ll be interesting to see if Parke employs the same strategy against another Brazilian southpaw in Trinaldo.

In my opinion, this should be a reasonably comfortable win for Parke if he remains intelligent. On paper he has the advantage in most areas, only truly coming off worse in strength and power. If he manages to weather the early storm that Trinaldo is likely to unleash, Parke is very capable of outsmarting Trinaldo by staying on the outside and winning the striking exchanges. If grappling does come into the equation, Parke has the skills to deny Trinaldo strong positions and wear him down in the process.

Prediction: Norman Parke via Unanimous Decision.