Las Vegas, NV – We haven’t even entered 2023 and we have our first fight casualty of the year as UFC welterweight Geoff Neal has withdrawn from his scheduled bout against Shavkat Rakhmonov at UFC Vegas 67 due to injury.
First reported by Igor Lazori.
According to Lazori the UFC will search for a replacement with about two weeks left until the event.
Neal (15-4) was riding a two-fight win streak with wins over Santiago Ponzinibbio, and Vicente Luque respectively. He was looking to start 2023 on a good note with a win over one of the best welterweights in the division in Rakhmonov.
Rakhmonov (16-0) was looking to move up the rankings. Currently at #10 in the welterweight rankings the thought was that a victory over #6 Neal would project Rakhmonov into title contention.
Now the UFC searches for a replacement, but with only a couple of weeks until the event it’s tough to see anyone in the top 10 taking the fight against Rakhmonov.
UFC Vegas 67 takes place at the UFC APEX on Jan. 14 with Nassourdine Imavov and Kelvin Gastelum set to face off in the main event. Currently the card stands as follows:
- Nassourdine Imavov vs. Kelvin Gastelum
- Punahele Soriano vs. Roman Kopylov
- Dan Ige vs. Damon Jackson
- Jimmy Flick vs. Charles Johnson
- Ketlen Vieira vs. Raquel Pennington
- Umar Nurmagomedov vs. Raoni Barcelos
- Abdul Razak Alhassan vs. Claudio Ribeiro
- Javid Basharat vs. Mateus Mendoca
- David Onama vs.
- Allen Nascimento vs. Carlos Hernandez
- Mateusz Rebecki vs. Nick Fiore
- Dan Argueta vs. Isaac Dulgarian
