Petr Yan nonetheless a title risk after UFC Macau win over Deiveson Figueiredo

Petr Yan and Deiveson Figueiredo have every gained a number of championship fights throughout their respective UFC careers, and the pair of former two-time titleholders engaged in a implausible five-round Fight Night foremost occasion on Saturday in Macau.

Yan handed Figueiredo his first loss for the reason that former flyweight champion moved as much as the bantamweight division, incomes a unanimous choice and firmly reinserting himself into the title dialog at 135 kilos.

Although the historical past books will present that Yan swept the scorecards, with all three judges seeing the bout 50-45, the struggle was aggressive for the total 25 minutes.

Figueiredo had gained three in a row at 135 kilos, together with a submission of former champion Cody Garbrandt in April, following his profitable run at 125 kilos.

The 36-year-old from Brazil dragged Yan to the canvas early within the opening spherical and labored to take the again and impose his jiu-jitsu on his Russian opponent. Yan defended Figueiredo’s floor recreation effectively and, halfway by the spherical, spun to finish up in Figueiredo’s guard, which mitigated danger from that place earlier than Yan additionally landed some strong floor strikes from the highest.

Yan ended Round 2 by throwing Figueiredo down with a tough Osotogari-style journey and started turning up the amount within the third.

Despite falling behind on the scorecards and accumulating some bruises alongside the way in which, Figueiredo by no means wavered and had his moments all through the match and into the later rounds. He briefly knocked Yan to the bottom within the fourth however the quantity was on Yan’s facet in each spherical.

When all was mentioned and accomplished, Yan greater than doubled Figueiredo in complete vital strikes, connecting on 121 of 193 makes an attempt, which was good for excellent 62 per cent accuracy.

Seamlessly switching stances from southpaw to orthodox and regularly snapping Figueiredo’s head again with uppercuts from the clinch, Yan confirmed off the well-rounded talent set that helped him rise to the highest of a stacked division at the moment dominated by Merab Dvalishvili.

Yan beforehand gained a vacant title by stopping Jose Aldo, then, later, an interim title when he beat Cory Sandhagen. The 31-year-old’s efficiency towards Figueiredo proved he’s nonetheless working at an exceptionally excessive stage.

Saturday’s win noticed him improv to 18-5 in blended martial arts however his report doesn’t inform the total story. Three of Yan’s losses have come by break up selections that each one might’ve gone his method and one loss was by disqualification — his notorious DQ towards Aljamain Sterling at UFC 259 that ended his first title reign.

Yan’s most clearcut, non-controversial and most up-to-date defeat was his five-round unanimous choice loss to Dvalishvili in March 2023.

Dvalishvili has since turn out to be champion. He gained the belt in September, when he gained a call over Sean O’Malley at UFC 306 and had mentioned that if Figueiredo might beat Yan, then he would’ve thought-about Figueiredo the No. 1 contender for his title.

Yan challenged Dvalishvili to a rematch throughout his post-fight interview Saturday, and the champ posted to social media that he was impressed by Yan’s efficiency and that it was an excellent struggle between each athletes.

O’Malley stays within the title image because the No. 1-ranked contender and one of many UFC’s largest stars. Undefeated Umar Nurmagomedov is ranked No. 2 and coming off a powerful win over Sandhagen.

The UFC has not but decided Dvalishvili’s first title defence opponent, however there are a number of choices and quite a few different high-quality matchups to make at 135 kilos heading into subsequent yr.

Yan Xiaonan bounced again from her five-round title struggle loss to reigning strawweight champion Weili Zhang in April at UFC 300 with an intensive victory over Tabatha Ricci in Saturday’s co-main occasion.

Zhang was at Galaxy Arena, so she heard first hand Xiaonan’s request for a championship rematch.

Muslim Salikhov ended his two-fight skid in fashion by touchdown a spinning-wheel kick knockout of Song Kenan within the opening spherical of their welterweight contest.

Salikhov, 40, has been throwing that actual kick all through his UFC profession, and on Saturday he turned the primary fighter in UFC historical past to complete two fights with the method. He additionally used it to place away André Fialho in 2022.

Gabriella Fernandes pulled off one of many largest upsets of the yr, a minimum of based on the betting odds, as she submitted kickboxing standout Wang Cong on Saturday.

Fernandes wobbled Cong with a head kick, dropped her with an overhand left and locked in a rear-naked choke that put the roughly 10-to-1 favorite to sleep within the second spherical.

Cong is a former champion from the kickboxing world — she even holds a win over UFC ladies’s flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko on her kickboxing report — and had a 62-second knockout win in her UFC debut in August, which added to the hype of her budding MMA profession.

China’s Zhang Mingyang had the gang roaring within the opening bout of the principle card by extending his profitable streak to 11 in a row.

Mingyang used a ravishing standing elbow strike to place down Ozzy Diaz in light-heavyweight motion. The 26-year-old is now 2-0 within the UFC after debuting earlier this yr with a first-round knockout of Brendson Ribeiro in February.

With his aggressive fashion and 100 per cent ending charge, Mingyang is a enjoyable 205-pounder to control heading into subsequent yr.

In extra notable 205-pound motion, Carlos Ulberg picked up the very best win of his UFC profession by outduelling one-time title challenger Volkan Oezdemir over quarter-hour.

Ulberg improved to 11-1 as a professional together with his seventh consecutive victory within the UFC. The City Kickboxing workforce member ought to proceed transferring up the official rankings and get one other massive matchup in his subsequent outing as a result of he was the No. 10-ranked contender and Oezdemir was ranked No. 8 within the division earlier than the occasion.

Ming landed a head kick that knocked Xiaocan out chilly throughout the third spherical of their 115-pound contest. Xiaocan was unconsciousness for a number of minutes. She was initially awake however unresponsive earlier than she started talking together with her coach within the ambulance. The UFC reported she had full feeling in all her extremities, had no fractures, and was not experiencing any ache, dizziness or complications.

Also within the prelims, flyweight prospect Lone’er Kavanagh improved to 8-0 as a professional by handing Jose Ochoa his first professional loss in a strong 125-pound scrap. Both fighters have brilliant futures within the division.

Bantamweight Xiao Long and flyweight Dong-hun Choi additionally had standout performances, incomes knockout wins over Quang Le and Kiru Singh Sahota, respectively.

The final UFC occasion held in Macau was in 2014, and it was headlined by Michael Bisping, who occurred to be on the commentary workforce Saturday.