Unfortunate news for PFL’s Artem Lobov who has been forced out of his scheduled bout with Zubaira Tukhugov at PFL Dubai after suffering an injury, pulling the plug on one of the card’s most anticipated matchups just days before the event.
Lobov (14-15-1) was set to return from a five-year retirement to finally settle his longstanding feud with Tukhugov, but a training injury derailed those plans. He later took to social media to explain the setback.
View this post on Instagram
“Hello everyone. So what happened last night I went training trying to get accustomed to the fight time. So I went pretty late. This week I’ve been feeling excellent, there’s no weight cut for me, so normally i’d be pretty drained.
This time I’m full of power, full of strength, my coaches cleared me to train all this week up until Wednesday.
I wanted to push hard. It’s an important fight for me.
We decided to grapple, tried to be safe, didn’t start standing up. From the floor to try and avoid injury. I got into it. I wanted to give it a hard push.
It was going really good. We just had an accidental head clash. Soon as that happened I could see blood everywhere.
Soon as I got back to the room I contacted PFL. Soon as the doctor came in, he saw the cut, he said there’s no way you can fight with that.”
The tension with Tukhugov traces back to a past altercation that sparked a chain of events culminating in Conor McGregor, then Lobov’s teammate and close friend, flying to New York and clashing with Khabib Nurmagomedov.
No word on if the bout will be rebooked for a later date.
