EVEN WITHOUT THE presence of one of the greatest fighters of all time, tonight’s UFC 198 card is the best that MMA’s leading organisation has served up so far this year.
Illness forced former middleweight champion Anderson Silva to withdraw from his bout against Uriah Hall earlier this week, but there’s still more than enough on the bill to justify a late night.
You know it’s a special card when the likes of Demian Maia and Matt Brown have to settle for a place on the prelims, although the fact that they were passed over for the main-card slot vacated by Silva and Hall did raise a few eyebrows.
Welterweights Warlley Alves and Bryan Barberena — the man who halted the Sage Northcutt hype train — are the beneficiaries instead, as they feature on a main card that will be headlined by an inaugural heavyweight title defence for Fabricio Werdum, who takes on Stipe Miocic.
The other highlights include an all-Brazilian middleweight co-headliner between Ronaldo ‘Jacare’ Souza and Vitor Belfort, and a long-awaited UFC debut for Cris ‘Cyborg’ Justino, who’s expected to encounter few problems against Leslie Smith.
But all eyes will be on the meeting of Werdum and Miocic, as the champion puts the belt on the line for the first time since he clinched it from Cain Velasquez 319 days ago.
If it goes to the ground, expect an elite Brazilian jiu-jitsu practitioner like Werdum to retain the belt. However, as Miocic — a former Golden Gloves champion — said this week: “It gets harder to do jiu-jitsu when you get punched in the face.”
UFC 198 takes place at the 45,000-capacity Arena de Baixada — the home of Brazilian football club Atletico Paranaense, which hosted four games at the 2014 World Cup — and the action begins on Fight Pass at 11.30pm Irish time, before switching to BT Sport 2 at 1am.
Who will emerge victorious from tonight’s heavyweight title bout at UFC 198 between champion Fabricio Werdum and challenger Stipe Miocic?
Poll Results:
UFC 198
Main card (BT Sport 2, 3am)
Fabricio Werdum vs. Stipe Miocic
Ronaldo ‘Jacare’ Souza vs. Vitor Belfort
Cris Cyborg vs. Leslie Smith
Mauricio Rua vs. Corey Anderson
Warlley Alves vs. Bryan Barberena
TV prelims (BT Sport 2, 1am)
Demian Maia vs. Matt Brown
Thiago Santos vs. Nate Marquardt
Francisco Trinaldo vs. Yancy Medeiros
John Lineker vs. Rob Font
Fight Pass prelims (UFCFightPass.com, 11.30pm)
Antonio Rogerio Nogueira vs. Patrick Cummins
Sergio Moraes vs. Luan Chagas
Renato Moicano vs. Zubaira Tukhugov
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