Highlights! Yan Smashes Aldo Late To Win Vacant Title

Photo by Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC

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Petr Yan lived up to the hype last night (Sat., July 11, 2020) at UFC 251 live on ESPN+ PPV from inside Flash Forum in Yas Island, Abu Dhabi, when the Russian fighter put a late beating on former featherweight champion Jose Aldo to win the vacant UFC bantamweight title. The official finish was a fifth-round TKO (punches).

Yan landed a big power shot midway through the first that hurt Aldo, but the former UFC champ responded with a whipping leg kick that knocked the Russian down. Yan was able to regain control towards the end of the round when he ended up on top landing heavy punches. In Round 2, Aldo came back on the scorecards with hard kicks to Yan’s lead leg. Yan kept pushing forward with counters but Aldo was able to continue scoring with jabs and strikes to the body.

The third saw Aldo do more work to the body as Yan started to slow. Aldo had the Russian hurt along the cage but Yan eventually recovered. Aldo would catch a few hard punches to the head towards the end of the frame as Yan began to heat up. Aldo went back to his body shots in the fourth but Yan was there again to return fire with combinations up top. Yan’s pressure looked to tire Aldo as his output dipped, allowing the Russian to take him down and land punches from full guard.

In the fifth and final round, Yan exploded on the feet to knock Aldo down to the canvas. Yan followed suit with hard ground-and-pound accompanied by elbows that really started to bust Aldo up. The referee refused to stop the fight as Aldo covered up and Yan unloaded everything in the bank. Eventually, Aldo couldn’t defend anything and the fight was finally stopped.

Check out the video highlights below courtesy of UFC/ESPN.

For complete UFC 251 results and coverage click here.