According to Fox Sports’ Damon Martin, Matt Brown returns to the Octagon May 10 at UFC Fight Night 40 to take on Brazilian Erick Silva inside Cincinnati’s U.S. Bank Center.
Brown racked up a six-fight winning streak inside the Octagon from February 2012 through August 2013, but a back injury sidelined him in December 2013, effectively neutralizing his momentum in the welterweight division.
Before the injury, he was slated to face Carlos Condit at UFC on Fox 9 in a matchup that looked the part of a No. 1 contender’s bout.
Now, however, Condit is fighting Tyron Woodley at UFC 171, and Brown’s absence has forced him to take somebody a little farther down the 170-pound ladder in the unranked Silva.
Brown told Fox Sports that he’s not too concerned about this step down in competition: “At this point in my career I’m not very far away from a title fight. That’s definitely what I’m looking to accomplish. I try to think of this as just another fight.”
Even though this fight does not capture the magnitude of the previously scheduled Brown vs. Condit scrap, it is an awesome bout and a worthy main event for UFC Fight Night 40.
Both Brown and Silva love to stand and trade and go for broke, as evidenced by their lack of decisions—in victory and in defeat—inside the Octagon.
While this main event is scheduled for five rounds, if history is any indication, we can expect a finish in Cincinnati on May 10 when these two welterweight sluggers wage war for the masses live on Fox Sports 1.
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