With Tristan Connelly forced out of his UFC 267 fight with Makwan Amirkhani, English featherweight Lerone Murphy is packing his bags and making the trip to Abu Dhabi once again.
UFC officials announced the pairing on social media Tuesday morning.
The undefeated Murphy (10-0-1) has seen all three of his UFC bouts go down in Abu Dhabi, and he’s yet to taste defeat in any of them. The closest he’s come was a draw with Zubaira Tukhugov in Murphy’s promotional debut back at UFC 242 in 2019.
Since then, he’s competed on “Fight Island” twice, putting together wins against Ricardo Ramos and Douglas Silva de Andrade. Lerone Murphy had been penciled in to face Charles Jourdain earlier this month in Las Vegas, but visa issues saw him pulled from the bout.
Amirkahni (16-6) has hit some hard times of late. “Mr. Finland” is 1-3 across his last four fights, and will enter UFC 267 off of back-to-back losses to Edson Barboza and Kamuela Kirk. Both fights went the distance and resulted in unanimous decisions against Amirkhani.
UFC 267 is set to take place October 30, 2021 on “Fight Island” (Yas Island) in Abu Dhabi. A light heavyweight title fight between Jan Blachowicz and Glover Teixeira headlines the event. A bantamweight title fight between Aljamain Sterling and Petr Yan had been anticipated as the co-headliner, but with Sterling out, it appears Cory Sandhagen will step into what is now an interim title fight.
