Montreal’s Rory MacDonald will fight in his adopted hometown after all when the UFC pulls through town on April 25. But he’ll be in the evening’s co-feature bout.
The UFC made official the main event and co-main event bouts for UFC 186 at the Bell Centre. In the main event, T.J. Dillashaw will defend his bantamweight title against former champion Renan Barao.
MacDonald, in the co-feature, will face Hector Lombard in a welterweight showdown, as was originally reported last weekend by MMAFighting.com.
Dillashaw (11-2) defeated Barao for the title and snapped his 28-fight unbeaten streak last May in Las Vegas, in what at the time was considered a major upset. Dillashaw won the bout on a fifth-round TKO.
The main event was set for UFC 177 in Sacramento on Aug. 30. But a weight cut gone awry forced Barao (33-2, 1 NC) to drop out of the fight. Dillashaw instead fought inaugural Bellator featherweight champ Joe Soto and finished him in the fifth round.
Barao, meanwhile, returned to action on Dec. 20 and earned a performance of the night bonus for his third-round submission of Mitch Gagnon.
As for the co-main, many felt MacDonald deserved the next shot at the welterweight title, and indeed, he had been promised it before Robbie Lawler edged Johny Hendricks to take the crown in December. It all proved to be moot, as Lawler wants time off, so instead, MacDonald will fight Lombard.
MacDonald (18-2) was won three in a row and eight of his last nine fights. The most recent was a third-round TKO of Tarec Saffeidine in October. Lombard (35-4-1, 1 NC), the former Bellator middleweight champ, has won four of his past five fights and is 3-0 since dropping to 170 pounds.