WEC 46: Jamie Varner vs Ben Henderson, Urijah Faber vs Raphael Assuncao officially announced

Published on: 2nd November, 2009

WEC 46: Jamie Varner vs Ben Henderson, Urijah Faber vs Raphael Assuncao officially announced  | read this item

WEC 46: Varner vs Henderson, Faber vs Assuncao was officially announced today to kick off the New Year on January 10, from the ARCO Arena in Sacramento, California in what should be the start of a fantastic year for the promotion.

Jamie Varner (16-2) will be returning to the cage for the first time since defeating Donald Cerrone last January. Varner is currently 4-0 in the WEC and will look to prove that he is the “real” WEC Lightweight champion when he takes on the very well rounded Ben Henderson. Varner will now get a chance to also silence critics who feel he was milking the injuries he suffered against Cerrone in their fight earlier this year.

Ben “Smooth” Henderson (10-1) is coming off of the biggest win of his career at WEC 43 where he defeated Varner’s nemesis Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone by unanimous decision to capture the WEC interim lightweight title. The fight was one of the best fights of 2009 and cost Henderson who is currently recovering from an eye injury.

The winner of this lightweight title fight will not have an easy road down the line as the division continues to grow and evolve with top lightweight talent. It also appears that the winner of the title fight will face off against the winner of the WEC 45 lightweight main event bout between Donald Cerrone vs Ed “9mm” Ratliff. As you can imagine this only insures more great fights in the WEC 155 pound division.

In the event’s co-main event of the night is the long rumored Urijah Faber vs Raphael Assuncao 145 pound featherweight contenders bout. While this fight has not officially been announced as a number 1 contenders bout, the winner will be looking at a possible bout against the winner of the WEC 44 main event featherweight title bout between Jose Aldo vs Mike Brown.

Urijah Faber (22-3) is coming off of his second consecutive loss to featherweight champion Mike Brown, but gained support for a third fight putting in a heart filled effort after breaking his hand attempting to recapture his title. Faber posted the pictures of the surgery needed to repair his hands after his fight on Twitter, needless to say he has a legitimate argument for a third title fight against the current champion. But he will need his wins to do the talking if he wants to meet up against Brown or Aldo in 2010.

Raphael Assuncao (14-1) is considered to be one of the sports top featherweight fighters and should offer a stiff challenge to Faber. He recently defeated Yves Jabouin at WEC 43 and showed a lot of heart and determination picking up his second straight win in the WEC. Assuncao has top notch Jiu Jitsu and should offer a good challenge to anyone that steps in the cage against him in 2010, Faber will be his first true challenge.

We will keep you up to date as soon as we find out more information on the fights that will be put together for this event as soon as we hear any new information and we are sure we will hear additional fights announced soon.

 Alberto Martinez "The Narcisist" is the founding owner of URDirt.com. If you would like to post on the front page or in our New "Fan Jab" section all you need to do is register. Read more from this author

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