#UFCMacau is shaping up nicely
Which fight are you most excited for?? pic.twitter.com/0qEawTiuEg
— UFC (@ufc) September 26, 2024
The Ultimate Fighting Championship’s trip back to the “Las Vegas of the East” is looking solid on paper.
On Wednesday night, the organization released a swath of new matchups for UFC Macau, also known as UFC Fight Night 248. Earlier in the day, the promotion dropped the headliner of Petr Yan vs. Deiveson Figueiredo. To fill out much of the Nov. 23 slate, a whopping seven pairings were made official or announced for the first time.
The lineup of the Fight Night affair is currently not set, although two main card matchups of Volkan Oezdemir (20-7) vs. Carlos Ulberg (10-1) at light heavyweight and Xiaonan Yan (18-4, 1 NC) vs. Tabatha Ricci (11-2) at strawweight have been set in stone. In the latter bout, it will be Oezdemir attempting to string together a three-fight win streak, an achievement he has not amassed since starting his UFC run at 3-0. His opponent Ulberg had a rocky debut in 2021, getting posterized by Kennedy Nzechukwu, but he has not looked back. “Black Jag” has since picked up six straight victories, including five inside the distance, and a 12-second drubbing of Alonzo Menifield in May sets him in the high-stakes clash.
In April, Yan attempted to scale the 115-pound mountain, but champion Weili Zhang kicked her back down several notches. The five-round decision setback put an end to a two-fight win streak for the woman from China, who notably earned her first stoppage with the promotion by punching out Jessica Andrade to get a crack at gold. Foe Ricci has won two fights in a row, taking home a pair of decisions over Tecia Pennington and Angela Hill in 2024. Her lone blemish in this weight class came against Lupita Godinez in November 2023.
Additional fights booked for the show to be held at the Galaxy Arena in Macau, China, include a welterweight collision between Muslim Salikhov (20-5) and Kenan Song (22-8), a flyweight tilt pitting Cong Wang (6-0) against Gabriella Fernandes (9-3), a light heavyweight contest as Osman Diaz (9-2) faces Mingyang Zhang (17-6), a 125-pound encounter between unbeaten youngsters as Lone’er Kavanagh (7-0) battles Jose Ochoa (7-0, 1 NC) and another scrap at 125 pounds between Carlos Hernandez (9-4) and Nyamjargal Tumendemberel (8-0).
