Thales Leites vs Anderson Silva at UFC 97

Yahoo! Sports have confirmed that Anderson "The Spider" Silva will be taking on Thales Leites in the main event of UFC 97. The event will take place at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada on April 18th, 2009.

This fight has been rumored for the past couple of days. MMA Junkie (link below) first broke the story that the two fighters had verbally agreed to a fight. The contracts have now been signed, and the fight is now official.

Anderson Silva was originally rumored to be headlining UFC 95, but apparently requested more time to train and stated that he wouldn't be ready to fight in time.

Silva is bringing a nine-fight winning streak into this fight. His most recent fight was a much talked-about win over Patrick Cote at UFC 90. Silva toyed with his opponent throughout the first two rounds - eventually the fight was halted when Cote hurt his right knee and could not continue.

There was a great deal of criticism directed at Silva after the fight. Many felt as though he wasn't taking Cote seriously - Silva defended himself following the tilt, saying that his gameplan was to knock out Cote in the fourth or fifth round.

Regardless, Silva seems to be very motivated for this next match-up, and I wouldn't be surprised if he tried to score a quick knock-out to regain some of his lost momentum.

Thales Leites has an impressive record of 14-1-0, which includes two knockouts and nine submission victories. Leites has won his last five fights in a row, including impressive victories over Ryan Jensen, Drew McFedries and Floyd Sword.

Leites will be looking to make a name for himself in this fight. An impressive performance against Silva would put Leites on the map, however he may have caught Silva at just about the worst time. As mentioned, Silva will be looking to score an emphatic victory after many questioned his gameplan in the Cote fight.

Betting lines have not been released as of yet, but you can probably expect Silva to be a -500 to -600 favorite to win.

Source: MMA Junkie

Yahoo! Sports - Silva vs Leites Set For UFC 97