TODAY - Ninja Rua ready for Alex Stiebling

Photo Andrey Klagenberg

Bitetti Combat’s promoters announced yesterday that Murilo “Ninja” Rua will be in the card of the event, which takes place this Saturday at Maracanãzinho, Rio de Janeiro, replacing Rogério “Minotouro” Nogueira against Alex Stiebling.

“We tried to keep Minotouro until we could, but he couldn’t recover from a ankle injury. We only could announce Ninja when everything was signed. We didn’t have Rogério, but I think Ninja is also a big name to the card… He’s a showman”, reveals Fernando Miranda, promoter of the event.

In exclusive interview to TATAME.com in August, Ninja already commented the possibility to replace Nogueira, who just signed with the UFC. “I’ll do my best… It’s great for our sport. I never fought in Rio de Janeiro, it’s gonna be a real pleasure”, said Ninja, who’ll fight at the light heavyweight division again, four years after his last 205lbs fight, against Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. Check below the complete card of the event.

Bitetti Combat 4

Maracanãzinho, Rio de Janeiro

Saturday, September 12th of 2009

- Ricardo Arona vs. Marvin Eastman;

- Paulo Filho vs. Alex Schoenauer;

- Pedro Rizzo vs. Jeff Monson;

- Murilo “Ninja” Rua vs. Alex Stiebling;

- Glover Teixeira vs. Leonardo Lucio “Chocolate”;

- Luciano Azevedo vs. Milton Vieira;

- Henrique Nogueira “Chocolate” vs. Eduardo Pamplona;

- Alexandre Pimentel “Pulga” vs. Luciano Yzzy;

- Vitor Miranda vs. Fabio Maldonado;

- Leandro Batata vs. Cassiano Tytschyo.