Article first published as Strikeforce News: Gilbert Melendez Set to Face Jorge Masvidal on Technorati.

News has emerged this week that Strikeforce lightweight champion Gilbert Melendez will defend his title against challenger Jorge Masvidal. The fight will headline an event that is set to take place on December 17th 2011 at the Valley View Casino Center in San Diego.

Melendez has won his last five fights in the cage with his most recent victory against Tatsuya Kawajiri at the “Strikeforce: Diaz Vs Daley” event held in April. He put on a dominant performance and secured the win with a first round TKO. I am sure Gilbert will look to put on a similar performance against Masvidal and pick up his third title defense.

The challenger Jorge Masvidal comes into this fight having won three of his last five MMA fights. Masvidal’s last bout was against KJ Noons in June of this year, he won the fight via unanimous decision due to his superior wrestling and grappling skills. Jorge will now step up to the plate and go for gold against Melendez.

UFC president Dana White has shown that he is interested in moving Gilbert Melendez over from Strikeforce to the UFC in the same fashion as his fellow team member and friend Nick Diaz, but it seems that will not be happening quite yet as they will have to get this title fight out of the way first.

I personally feel that Melendez could get another title defense under his belt, but if Masvidal manages to use his grappling to control the fight he has every chance of scoring a victory. It will be very interesting to see how the fight will pan out.

For those of you interested in watching the event it will air on Showtime and for more information on the card and tickets you can visit: http://www.strikeforce.com/

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