Alex Gustafsson leading light in Sweden as MMA booms with the ban on professional boxing Gustafsson, as Sweden's flagship fighter in the world's leading mixed martial arts organisation, and predictably perhaps, known as 'The Viking', has risen rapidly through the ranks with several high-profile victories in the last eighteen months which have seen his status grow as a potential future opponent for the UFC's incumbent light-heavyweight champion Jon Jones, a wunderkind in the MMA world. Both men are part of a new breed in the sport, in their early twenties, and drawing on huge support. I think it helps the fact boxing has been banned, we haven't had any professional boxing in Sweden since the 60s or even the 50s when boxing was on the map. MMA has grown so much this recent 5 years and we have some real pioneers, Swedish guys that studied MMA back in the Pancrase days. They established the gyms in Sweden and because it is quite a small country people travelled around. Today I would say it's definitely one of the fastest growing sports we have here. I'm not sure the Swedish crowd is as noisy as the crowds in Brazil for MMA, but I hope they will be fairly loud," said Sallfeldt. The Swedish can be quite passionate as well. One thing that is fantastic about the Swedish crowd, though, is that they are very knowledgeable. A lot of them have been to a lot of events obviously in different countries all over the place, so you will see them cheering for finer points and things you wouldn't normally consider everywhere else. The Swedish crowd really understands the sport. Alex is definitely a rising star here, you can see him more in the media. There is a lot of guys that, from other disciplines, that are also well known but Alex is definitely the one who stands out. Stand out on Saturday night, and Gustafsson will move inexorably towards the prize he covets: the UFC light-heavyweight belt.