UFC middleweight contender Paulo Costa is forced out of a planned January main event against Yoel Romero.
Middleweights Paulo Henrique Costa and Yoel Romero are lacking good luck, at the moment.
After ‘Soldier of God’ was forced out his fight against ‘Borrachinha’ at UFC 230 on November 3 because of a broken orbital bone, ESPN reported that the Brazilian was removed from what was due to be the main event of the first UFC on ESPN+ card on January 19th in Brooklyn, New York.
Sources also told ESPN that Romero doesn’t want to wait for Costa to be back, which should be around March, and instead Yoel wishes to take on former champion Anderson Silva.
Paulo Costa (12-0) is on a four-fight winning streak in the Octagon, with knockout wins over the likes of Garreth McLellan, Oluwale Bamgbose, Johny Hendricks and Uriah Hall. Meanwhile, Romero (13-3) dropped a split decision to current middleweight champion Robert Whittaker back in June, but was ineligible to win the title after missing weight. Before that, Yoel scored a KO win over former champion Luke Rockhold.
As for Silva, whom Romero wants to fight instead of Costa on that January event, he hasn’t competed since beating Derek Brunson by unanimous decision in February 2017. The legendary former UFC middleweight champion recently served a reduced USADA suspension after testing positive for methyltestosterone and hydrochlorothiazide, but was found to have ingested a contaminated supplement.