"The big announcement is that I won't be participating in the GLORY tournament".
With these words, spoken in a recent podcast appearance, {Antonio Plazibat} has officially confirmed that he won't be taking part in the upcoming GLORY Heavyweight Grand Prix on March 9, despite the earlier announcement.
Plazibat would go on to say: "I think of all the people who could replace me at the moment, the most interesting one is {Jamal Ben Saddik}." Despite this and the wishes of many kickboxing fans, the promotion has instead decided to replace Plazibat with {Nordine Mahieddine}. The French-born Algerian has both overcome and suffered a loss at the hands of the Croatian Heavyweight and currently sits at the No. 4 spot in the official GLORY Heavyweight rankings. He last competed in September last year, when he knocked out {Abdarhmane Coulibaly} in spectacular fashion.
Fortunately however, the reason for Plazibat's withdrawal isn't re-injury, it's simply that he hasn't yet fully healed. As he chose to let the bone heal naturally, through a cast and physical therapy, the timeline for his return was longer than had he undergone surgery.
The Split native had the following to say about his withdrawal: "So my arm will have healed by the 9th of March. But I would have to enter the fight without any serious training, without any sparring, without having received a single strike on that arm. It's not smart, it's one of the most idiotic things you could do. And then I have to fight two more times that evening. Even if I do knock out my first opponent as soon as the fight starts, my opponent in the second round would just [aim for the arm]".
Source: beyondkick.com