{"id":908,"date":"2023-01-18T17:33:27","date_gmt":"2023-01-18T18:33:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/?p=908"},"modified":"2025-06-20T10:53:16","modified_gmt":"2025-06-20T10:53:16","slug":"russian-ufc-star-set-to-face-georgian-rival-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/18\/russian-ufc-star-set-to-face-georgian-rival-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Russian UFC star set to face Georgian rival"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former champion Petr Yan has been defeated in his past two UFC bouts<\/strong><\/p>\n

Former UFC bantamweight champion Petr Yan will look to re-establish his title credentials at 135lbs when he faces Georgia’s Merab Dvalishvili in a five-round fight which will headline the organization’s Las Vegas card on March 11. <\/p>\n

Yan, previously a titleholder in Russia’s ACB promotion (now known as ACA), made significant waves upon entering the UFC in 2018, winning seven straight fights – the last of which was a TKO victory over mixed martial arts legend Jose Aldo to claim the then-vacant bantamweight crown. <\/p>\n

His first title defense, though, did not go to plan when he was disqualified in the fourth round of a fight with Aljamain Sterling when the American fighter was unable to continue after Yan landed an illegal knee strike to Sterling’s head.<\/p>\n

Yan rebounded with a victory against the technically outstanding Cory Sandhagen, only to lose a close decision to Sterling in their rematch in April of last year.<\/p>\n

\n

Aljamain Sterling and Merab Dvalishvili had a little exchange with Petr Yan backstage last night following the ceremonial weigh-ins.\ud83d\ude33<\/p>\n

The wave from Yan at the end.\ud83e\udd23\ud83e\udd23\ud83e\udd23#UFC273<\/a> #UFC<\/a> #MMA<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/zSfbYbV0GB<\/a><\/p>\n

— MMA Orbit (@mma_orbit) April 9, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yan’s most recent outing in the octagon saw him drop another razor-thin judges’ decision to the up-and-coming Sean O’Malley, despite many analysts suggesting that Yan was the rightful victor. <\/p>\n

If Yan is to rebound back towards the summit of the UFC bantamweight division, his path has been set through Dvalishvili – the Georgian powerhouse who is in the midst of an eight-fight win streak in the cage.<\/p>\n

The Tblisi native, who also recently defeated Octagon icon Jose Aldo, has soared up the rankings ladder in recent months owing to a series of dominant performances to stand him on the verge of title contention. <\/p>\n

However, Dvalishvili has said that he won’t chase the championship belt while it is around the waist of Sterling, a close friend and training partner of his. <\/p>\n

But should Yan overcome Dvalishvili, it may provide the impetus for a third fight with the champion – this time with a measure of revenge potentially on the line.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former champion Petr Yan has been defeated in his past two UFC bouts Former UFC bantamweight champion Petr Yan will look to re-establish his title credentials at 135lbs when he faces Georgia’s Merab Dvalishvili in a five-round fight which will headline the organization’s Las Vegas card on March 11. Yan, previously a titleholder in Russia’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":906,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=908"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/908\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":910,"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/908\/revisions\/910"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vegacelis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}