The Extreme Fighting Championship has come a long way since
its maiden event in November 2009. Since then the promotion has managed to grow
from strength to strength and has produced eleven spectacular MMA events in
Johannesburg, South Africa. During this time, the EFC has unsurprisingly built up a huge fan following in the city.
The EFC has also very obviously had expansion plans, but to successfully
execute these plans, they needed to ensure that they never ostracised the
audience that they had worked so hard to build. This meant that they needed to
overcome the technological barriers which prevented remote fans from watching
MMA events.
EFC 12 is the first event where this has truly been
achieved. With coverage on eTV, in Nu Metro cinemas nationwide and online via
PPV, fans from across South Africa and the world are now able to tune into EFC
events live! Apart from enabling the EFC to broadcast to interested fans
worldwide, this has also enabled the EFC to be mobile and to aggressively seek
out and earn new fans, all while sufficiently nurturing their current fans with
broadcast coverage.
Quick to act, the EFC has already announced their first
non-Johannesburg event, EFC Africa 13 – Jakobi vs Costa, which will take place
in Cape Town in April 2012. But where to from there?
With an already thriving MMA community, producing some of
the top MMA fighters in the country, including EFC Africa fighters Dallas Jakobi, Wentzel Nel, Donavin Hawkey, Wesley Hawkey and Sean Robinson to name
but a few, Durban seems a very likely candidate for EFC Africa 14. The seaside
community has also been at the fore of MMA in many regards, and currently hosts
many professional and amateur MMA events, though nothing quite the size of EFC.
This gives the promotion a great foundation to enter into Durban and build on
the already flourishing sport and MMA fan base. This in turn can only be good
for the sport in Durban and good for the EFC.
I think it is very likely that we will see the EFC venture
into Kwazulu Natal and more specifically Durban in the near future. Will EFC
Africa 14 be the first event in the Zulu kingdom? Only time can tell, but I
have a hunch that if not EFC 14, it will not be long before we see the EFC
coming to Durban.
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