Dutch security guard stops armed attack with strikes

At a supermarket in the Netherlands, a 34-year-old man was removed from the store by security for attempting to steal a bottle of alcohol. He returned and attacked guard with a broken bottle neck, resulting in injuries to both. The man was arrested and hospitalised overnight, so he obviously came out of the ordeal in far worse shape then the guard.

He faces charges of attempted manslaughter or serious assault and will appear in court on February 14 2024.

The actions of the guard were considered self-defense.

Dutch article covering the incident here.

Although not a knife, a piece of glass can cause serious or potentially fatal injuries. There’s certainly the risk of losing an eye, the way this man was attempting to slash at the guard.

The response of the guard demonstrates how effective distance management, footwork and striking can be against edged weapons. These are not the typical wrist-grabby techniques we often see taught by “self defense” instructors, but fundamental methods from empirically developed styles such as Muay Thai and wrestling.

This could easily have resulted in the guard suffering far more serious injuries had there been an inch or two of difference, and I have shared these scenarios on the site before.

My point here is NOT that learning a martial art will guarantee success, however:

  1. The chance of surviving an attack from someone armed with an edged weapon increases the greater the difference in skill/size/strength/etc.
  2. The methods we see working in reality are consistently the same fundamentals we observe in other fights, including combat sports.

Two Vs One Self Defense case study: MMA fighter vs two “Eshays” in Brisbane

Link to Reddit discussion

A higher quality version of the video is available on my youtube channel.

After making this video, I found a 1-hour long interview with Viktor. I definitely recommend watching this interview. He offers insights into his thinking during the confrontation, talks about his past experiences with violence and how this lead to his training and MMA career, and they broadly discuss violence what motivates young men to engage in this kid of behaviour.

Machete duel in England

A rare video: Two men duelling with machetes. Technically, one is using a “zombie knife”, a name which is really nothing more than a marketing gimmick. It isn’t much shorter than the opponent’s machete and appears to have a thicker spine.

This video is important because it demonstrates two things:

  1. Unarmed methods such as striking, grappling and ground fighting still matter and can be pivotal, even when blades are in the fight;
  2. Inflicting severe wounds might not be enough to stop a determined opponent.

News article with added photos of injuries – *GRAPHIC*

Zombie knife and machete used in broad daylight street brawl in Morecambe


Two men have been jailed over a broad daylight street fight which saw one of them slashed in the neck.

A machete and zombie knife were used in the “terrifying” brawl which broke out on a quiet estate in Morecambe. Horrified onlookers watched in shock as John Reid and David Jowett fought with the deadly weapons last May.

Footage of the incident was recorded by one witness and was played at Preston Crown Court today as the pair were sentenced for wounding each other and making threats with the weapons. The court heard that Jowett arrived at Reid’s home on Bartholomew Road after an earlier incident at the Station pub. Details of that earlier incident could not be agreed by either party and as such, the cause of the violent and bloody brawl remains unknown to the courts.

WARNING – GRAPHIC PHOTOS OF INJURIES