UFC featherweight fighter Zabit Magomedsharipov was scheduled to fight Zair Rodriguez on August 29th in a bout that could have been decisive for the title picture at 145. This fight was already scheduled to happen once in the past but didn’t happen through various circumstances.
The news was announced on Tuesday by UFC president Dana White. White said that Rodriguez was forced out of the fight due to an injury. Magomedsharivop finds himself without an opponent but maybe not for long. ESPN’s Ariel Helwani reported that Calvin Kattar offered to step in on short notice to fight Magomedsharipov.
Just be to clear here, Kattar offered to step in. UFC hasn’t decided yet what they’ll do with Zabit.
— Ariel Helwani (@arielhelwani) August 5, 2020
Helwani also added that the offered came from Kattar but
“UFC hasn’t decided yet what they’ll do with Zabit”.
If the fight gets scheduled it would be a rematch, as the two fighters already faced off before last year. Their first meet-up was the fight of the night and Magomedsharipov won by unanimous decision. Although many experts argued that the result might have been different had the fight been scheduled for five rounds.
At this point in their respective career, a fight between the two men could very well earn them a shot at the featherweight title.
