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The battle of the Brandons part two is officially on.

Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) announced today (Thurs., Jan. 11, 2024) after an interview with Brandon Moreno (21-7-2) from ESPN Deportes’ Carlos Contreras Legaspi that a new Flyweight main event is headed to UFC Mexico in Mexico City next month (Sat., Feb. 24, 2024). What was originally set to be Moreno vs. his fellow top-ranked contender, Amir Albazi, will now be a rematch between Moreno and the most recent title challenger, Brandon Royval (15-7).

Update: Albazi revealed on Twitter that a lingering neck injury led to his withdrawal.

“I don’t know what happened with Amir Albazi, but he’s out of the fight,” Moreno told Legaspi. “So, now I’m gonna fight against Brandon Royval. He fought for the belt in December. I’m just ready. It’s just about the next opponent.

“I just want the opportunity to fight for the title again and if UFC says I have to fight one more time before that, I will,” he concluded.

The first fight between the pair of Flyweights took place in November 2020 and resulted in a Moreno first round technical knockout that ultimately ascended him to championship status the year after. Since then, each has won three fights with two losses and will both look to rebound off title fight shortcomings to the current champion, Alexandre Pantoja.

“It was a fast, quick fight,” Moreno said of the first Royval fight. “Royval had this problem in the shoulder, but I really believe I was winning the fight so … He was saying a lot of different things on social media about our fight in 2020, but at the end, we are going to fight again. In front of my people, and I’m excited for that.”

The current line up for UFC Mexico can be seen below.

• 125lbs.: Brandon Moreno vs. Brandon Royval
• 145lbs.: Yair Rodríguez vs. Brian Ortega
• 155lbs.: Manuel Torres vs. Chris Duncan
• 125lbs.: Jesús Santos Aguilar vs. Mateus Mendonça
• 115lbs.: Yazmin Jauregui vs. Sam Hughes
• 125lbs.: Edgar Chairez vs. Daniel Lacerda
• 125lbs.: Victor Altamirano vs. Felipe dos Santos
• 135lbs.: Raul Rosas Jr. vs. Ricky Turcios
• 125lbs.: Luis Rodriguez vs. Denys Bondar
• 155lbs.: Daniel Zellhuber vs. Francisco Prado
• 135lbs.: Raoni Barcelos vs. Cristian Quiñonez
• 145lbs.: Muhammad Naimov vs. Erik Silva
• 155lbs.: Farès Ziam vs. Claudio Puelles

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A welterweight fight between Randy Brown and Muslim Salikhov has been added to UFC Vegas 85, and the Feb. 3 fight card has lost three fighters due to injury, the promotion announced Thursday.

Among the fighters scrapped from the winter event: Nate Maness, Kiefer Crosbie and William Gomis.

Maness was scheduled to take on Azat Maksum, but Maksum will now take on Charles Johnson in a flyweight bout. Welterweight Crosbie has been replaced by Pete Rodriguez, who will now take on Themba Gorimbo.

Additionally, a featherweight bout between William Gomis and Melsik Baghdasaryan has been cancelled due to Gomis’ withdrawal, and Baghdasaryan will now face Hyder Amil at UFC Vegas 86 on Feb. 10 in Las Vegas, the promotion announced.

Brown vs. Salikhov was scheduled to take place at UFC 296 before Salikhov was scratched due to illness. Brown hopes to rebuild after a setback to Jack Della Maddalena scrapped a four-fight winning streak, while Salikhov is 1-2 in his past three outings after a unanimous decision loss to Nicolas Dalby.

UFC Vegas 85 is headlined by a middleweight fight between standouts Roman Dolidze and Nassourdine Imavov. The fight card, which takes place at UFC APEX in Las Vegas, is expected to air on ESPN+.

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Dricus Du Plessis spoke with UFC CEO Dana White about potentially pressing charges against Sean Strickland after the reigning 185-pound champ attacked him in the crowd at the promotion’s final pay-per-view of 2023.

Following a heated verbal confrontation at the UFC Seasonal Press Conference last month, tempers boiled over inside T-Mobile Arena when Strickland and Du Plessis were seated in the same section for UFC 296. After politely asking Gilbert Burns’ family to move out of the way, Strickland lept over the seats and attacked Du Plessis, giving fight fans a preview of their highly anticipated middleweight title clash scheduled to go down on January 20 in Toronto.

Both fighters walked away from the incident unscathed, but given that Strickland initiated the scuffle, Du Plessis was given the option to press charges.

“I know Dana came to me and said, ‘Listen, this is the case. We’re really sorry about this,” Du Plessis told MMA Junkie. “Obviously, the police had him and charges can be pressed because that’s assault. It’s outside of a professional arena. They didn’t try to convince me otherwise at all. They literally said, ‘If you feel like that was uncalled for, we completely understand if you want to press charges and take this further.’

“I said, ‘No, no, no, no, no. Please no.’ We are two fighters. It was a good old scrap like we did before we became professionals. I just paused and was like, ‘I would even take the blame if that’s possible, just to make sure that nothing happens to him’” (h/t BJPenn.com).

Had ‘Stillknocks’ opted to press charges, it likely would have spelled the end of their anticipated title tilt in The Great White North.

“We know to come to Canada, they are very strict,” Du Plessis continued. “They are very, very strict in getting into the country. I just wanted to make sure that if the fight wasn’t in jeopardy. I never even think of Sean Strickland trying to get away. He’s the type of guy who’s always game. He’s a guy who will go out on his shield and do it with honor.”

“I took on his manliness. I was in his face. I told him, ‘What are you going to do about it?’ He stood up for himself. That’s what a real man does. I’m happy for him. I’m glad he has that in him. No matter what the situation, what the repercussions, he didn’t think about it. He said, ‘I’m standing up for myself,’ and rightfully so. That’s where the respect comes from because that’s exactly what I would’ve done.”

Dricus Du Plessis Is Ready to Drop the drama and focus on winning gold

With fight night closing in, Du Plessis is content to leave all the drama behind and focus on capturing his first UFC title.

“I hope it’s over now, but there’s not going to be one-ups. There are no one-ups. What’s going to happen, is going to happen. We’ll see how it plays out, but right now my focus is on the fight. I’m not here to be funny. I’m not here to try and create something that there’s not. I’m here to be the next champion of the world. That’s why I’m here. I’m not going to be here to try to one-up or get even further. I’m going to do what I’m going to do and he’s going to do what he’s going to do. But right now, it’s almost senseless to try to create more hype.”

“The hype has been created. That took care of itself. Right now, for me, this is business. The whole fight week is business. Everything I handle, I’ll handle it like business. Saturday night, I’ll be signing on the dotted line, closing the deal.”

UFC 297 will emanate from Scotiabank Arena. Strickland defends his title for the first time since scoring a stunning unanimous decision victory against Israel Adesanya to claim the crown in September. Du Plessis goes into his first title opportunity backed by six-straight wins inside the Octagon. Stillknocks’ earned his shot with a brutal second-round knockout of Robert Whittaker at UFC 290.

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Fresh off his win on The Ultimate Fighter Season 31, Kurt Holobaugh returns to action against Trey Ogden in a new matchup expected to take place at the UFC Fight Night card on March 23.

Multiple people with knowledge of the promotion’s plans confirmed the news to MMA Fighting on Thursday.

Holobaugh earned his third stint on the UFC roster after joining the reality show coached by Conor McGregor and Michael Chandler this past year. After scoring wins over Lee Hammond and Jason Knight on the series, he secured his new contract with a second-round triangle choke submission over Austin Hubbard at UFC 292.

He faces off with Ogden, who ended up with a bizarre no-contest on his resume from his previous outing after originally picking up a win over Nikolas Motta. His fight was stopped by referee Mike Beltran after Ogden locked on an arm-triangle choke in the third round.

Unfortunately, Motta never tapped and he wasn’t unconscious, which led to a cageside review, and the fight ultimately was declared a no-contest.

Now, Ogden attempts to right that wrong when he returns to action in March with the showdown scheduled against Holobaugh.

As of now, the UFC Fight Night card on March 23 doesn’t have a main event, though Holobaugh vs. Ogden is the latest addition with several other matchups previously confirmed for the same show, which is expected to take place at the UFC APEX in Las Vegas.

Mike Heck contributed to this report.

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The hype surrounding UFC 300 is unlike ever before, with fans wondering which huge fights will take place at the historic event. While there’s still a lot of space for new fights, Dana White has announced the first title affair for the card.

UFC 300 has been highly anticipated by fans since last year, with many expecting some of the biggest names in the sport to be featured. Alongside the confirmed bouts, rumors are ramping up about fantasy matchups for April 13.

In a post on social media, Dana White revealed the first championship match for the coveted UFC 300 event and it’s a big one. For the first time in the company’s history, a Chinese champion will defend against a Chinese challenger.

“On August 13, 2019, history was made when Weili Zhang beat Jessica Andrade to become the first Chinese champion in UFC history.”

“Well, guess what. Five years later, we will see history being made again as Weili Zhang faces number-one contender, Yan Xiaonan for the UFC strawweight title on UFC 300. And this is the first time two Chinese contenders have faced off for a world title.”

Though there are many more announcements to come, White detailed why Zhang Weili vs. Yan Xiaonan is an underrated clash between two of the very best at 155 lbs.

“Weili Zhang has 19 finishes in 24 wins. That’s an 80% finish rate,” White said about the strawweight queen. “She is tied for the second most title wins in strawweight history and she was involved in arguably one of the greatest fights ever versus Joanna Jedrzejczyk.”

Related: Dana White reveals UFC 299 co-main event

“Yan is the first Chinese female ever signed to the UFC. She’s got the most head strikes landed in a single UFC strawweight fight ever.”

“She is coming off a first-round knockout against Jessica Andrade in under three minutes… She has eight first-round knockouts.”

“This fight has bada** written all over it. So, there’s one of the title fights for UFC 300.”

Check out Dana White’s announcement for UFC 300 in the video below.

BREAKING NEWS: Zhang vs Yan will happen at #UFC300. The first ever Chinese vs Chinese title fight. pic.twitter.com/ztyTnbCxHi

— danawhite (@danawhite) January 11, 2024

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