Nunes-Shevchenko rematch placed on UFC 215 Edmonton card Sept. 9
This month’s scrapped women’s bantamweight title fight between champion Amanda Nunes and No. 1 contender Valentina Shevchenko will be held Sept. 9 at UFC 215 in Edmonton, Canada, the UFC announced Thursday.
In keeping with the word of UFC President Dana White, who said he didn’t want to put Nunes back in a main event after she backed out of UFC 213 in Las Vegas July 8 with symptoms including sinus issues, the main event will be flyweight champion Demetrious Johnson’s title defense against Ray Borg.
Johnson (26-2-1) is seeking to surpass former long-reigning middleweight champion Anderson Silva’s record for 10 consecutive successful title defenses against Borg (11-2), a strong wrestler rated No. 3 in the division.
White was also perturbed previously with Johnson for failing to agree to fight former bantamweight champion T.J. Dillashaw, the former Cal State Fullerton wrestler whose scheduled July title fight against unbeaten Cody Garbrandt was scrapped after Garbrandt was injured.
Brazil’s Nunes (14-4) drew White’s ire by insisting she was unfit to fight Shevchenko after a physician medically cleared her on the morning of the scheduled Shevchenko fight.
Nunes later explained she was suffering from painful sinusitis, and vowed to return “100%” for her rematch with Shevchenko (14-2), whom Nunes defeated by unanimous decision in March 2016.
The card at Edmonton’s new arena, Rogers Place, will also include a meeting of top-five heavyweights with former champion Junior Dos Santos (18-5) of Brazil meeting Paris’ Francis Ngannou (10-1).
A bout between Southern California-based lightweight veterans Jeremy Stephens and Gilbert Melendez is also positioned for the pay-per-view broadcast.
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