The season nine Bellator MMA lightweight tournament kicked off at Bellator 101 on Friday night in Portland and the semifinal bouts are now set as Saad Awad meets Will Brooks and Alexander Sarnavskiy faces Ricardo Tirloni. 
Bellator MMA Chairman and CEO Bjorn Rebney announced the matchups at the Bellator 101 Post Fight Press Conference and both semifinals will take place at Bellator 105.
Bellator 105 will take place on October 25th from the Santa Ana Star Center in Rio Rancho, New Mexico and the main card will air live on Spike TV.
Awad secured his spot in the semifinal by submitting Martin Stapleton in the opening fight of the Bellator 101 main card. This was his seventh career win by submission and he will meet Brooks, who dominated John Alessio to win by decision.
The semifinal bout between Awad and Brooks will be a rematch of their season eight lightweight tournament semifinal, which Awad won by knockout in the first round. Their first meeting also took place at the Santa Ana Star Center and this will be the third time that Brooks will compete at the venue.
The other semifinal bout will feature Bellator tournament veterans with Sarnavskiy meeting Tirloni. Sarnavskiy submitted Marcus Davis in the first round in the co-main event at Bellator 101 and Tirloni scored a decision victory over Rich Clementi. Both fighters will be looking to advance to their first Bellator lightweight tournament final and Sarnavskiy will be searching for his fifth straight victory.
Bellator MMA will be announcing more fights for Bellator 105 in the coming weeks and tickets are currently on sale for the fight card coming from the Santa Ana Star Center in New Mexico.