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Khamzat Chimaev returned to motion after a yr away from the cage at UFC 294 and it was a basic efficiency … for the primary 5 minutes, anyway.
Chimaev ragdolled former welterweight champion Kamaru Usman by the primary spherical, taking him down and threatening to submit him. The domination was so thorough that every one three judges awarded “Borz” the primary spherical with 10-8 scores.
However one thing modified in Chimaev for the second and third rounds. He was tentative, and Kamaru used the house granted by Khamzat to battle his approach again to a slender majority resolution loss. Following the battle, Chimaev revealed he suffered a hand injury early within the battle and was was fearful he may need damaged it.
Now we now have an replace on that damage. Chimaev’s supervisor Majdi Shammas reached out to ESPN to say Khamzat’s hand isn’t damaged, however the fighter does have a torn ligament that can require a brace for a month. No surgical procedure might be required, which is lucky.
This clears the way in which for Khamzat Chimaev to battle Sean Strickland for the middleweight title at an occasion in early 2024. With Chimaev at the moment unable to journey to the US, dates are restricted as to when that battle may happen. Fortuitously, the UFC has an event booked in Saudi Arabia for March. It’s being held in the identical 28,000 seat area that simply hosted Tyson Fury vs. Francis Ngannou, and we now have little question the stops might be pulled out to verify it’s an enormous affair.
A title battle between Chimaev and Strickland appears like a reasonably good battle to put atop that card.
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