Two Nordic fighters will be on the Cage Warriors 53 card that takes place in Glasgow, Scotland on the 13th of April. As previously reported, Finnish fighter Joni Salovaara (12-5) signed with the Cage Warriors promotion, and will make his debut against the American prospect Jim “the Beast” Alers (9-1). This will be for the Featherweight Title as newly crowned star prospect of the UFC Conor McGregor vacated his two CWFC titles to fight in the Octagon.

Salovaara is the #3 ranked Nordic Featherweight and is on a three-fight win streak and has won 10 of 11 fights since 2009. His recent wins have come against Cage Warriors veterans such as Olivier Pastor and Moktar Benkaci.

Alers, meanwhile, looks for his sixth straight win and his third consecutive victory in Cage Warriors. Most recently, the Florida-based fighter has posted stoppage wins over Matteus Lahdesmaki and Marcio Cesar.

Nilsson (9-2-1) had been scheduled to fight Denniston Sutherland at Cage Warriors 50 in Glasgow in December but withdrew from the bout after sustaining an injury. The 29-year-old Swede, who’s currently ranked ninth in Europe and number 2 in the Nordics, submitted UFC veteran Tommy Speer at CWFC Fight Night 3 last year, but will be keen to rebound from a decision loss to current TUF star Tor Troeng in his most recent outing. He will face Chris Scott in a middleweight bout.

“I’m expecting this fight to be both technical and wild,” said Nilsson. “Having similar strengths, it’ll come down to who wants it most; who’s willing to work that little bit harder for an inch of an advantage. I want it bad and I’m more than willing to work hard for it.”

Scott (6-1), who joined Nilsson as an exclusively contracted Cage Warriors fighter last month, is currently on a five-fight win streak and is ranked as one of the UK’s top 20 middleweights. The 30-year-old, who hails from Sunderland in the north-east of England, has secured all six of his wins by submission.

Fight Card

MAIN CARD (MMAjunkie.com, 21:00 Reykjavik, 22:00 Stockholm/Oslo/Copenhagen, 23.00 Helsinki)
Jim Alers vs. Joni Salovaara – for vacant featherweight title
Joanne Calderwood vs. Sally Krumdiack
Mats Nilsson vs. Chris Scott
Jason Ball vs. Jason Cooledge
Paul Marin vs. Neil Seery
James Doolan vs. James Pennington

PRELIMINARY CARD (Facebook, 20:00 Reykjavik, 21:00 Stockholm/Oslo/Copenhagen, 22.00 Helsinki)
Rich Edgeworth vs. Jean N’Doye
Mark Connor vs. Joe Laurence

Card Promo