There has been some reshuffling among recent bookings in the
Ultimate Fighting Championship’s flyweight division.
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As a result of those changes, Alex Perez
will now square off against Tatsuro
Taira in the main event of a UFC
Fight Night card on June 15. Perez was originally scheduled to
face Tagir
Ulanbekov at the event, while Taira was supposed to face
Joshua
Van at UFC 302
on June 1. Now, Ulanbekov and Van will lock horns on June 15.
Multiple outlets confirmed the new 125-pound pairings following an
initial report from Marcel Dorff.
Perez snapped a three-bout skid in his last outing, as he knocked
out Matheus
Nicolau in the second round of the UFC on ESPN 55 headliner.
The former title challenger is 7-4 during his stint with the Las
Vegas-based promotion.
The 24-year-old Taira has kicked off his Octagon tenure with five
consecutive triumphs to raise his overall professional mark to
15-0. The Okinawa, Japan, native capped off a 3-0 campaign in 2023
with a second-round TKO of Carlos
Hernandez at UFC Fight Night 233 on Dec. 9.
Russia’s Ulanbekov has been victorious in four of his first five
UFC appearances. Most recently, the former Fight Nights Global
title holder submitted Cody Durden
in the second round of their UFC 296 encounter this past
December.
Another intriguing flyweight prospect, Van has earned successive
triumphs over Zhalgas
Zhumagulov, Kevin
Borjas and Felipe
Bunes to begin his UFC career. The 22-year-old Fury Fighting
Championship veteran is 10-1 as a professional, with eight of those
victories coming inside the distance.