Petr Yan was recently forced to pull out of his scheduled Bantamweight title fight against Aljamain Sterling, which was set to headline UFC 256 on Dec. 12, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
And while no details were given as to why, Yan recently broke his silence to explain what exactly happened that forced him out of his first-ever title defense.
“Everything’s in force for the fight. It’s going to be postponed for about a month and a half, but everything’s in order,” Yan said during a recent Instagram chat with fans, courtesy of RT Sport. “There were different problems, with the flight, with the visa, during training I flew away for a visa deadline, lots of factors.”
Yan won the title earlier this year at UFC 251, stopping Jose Aldo via strikes to claim the vacant 135-pound strap (see it again here). Winner of 10 straight, Yan quickly became one of the most dangerous fighters in the division and now that he has the belt, all eyes and big bulls eye will be on him.
Once he gets his visa issues situated, “No Mercy” hopes that the UFC brass can reschedule his fight against “Funkmaster” as soon as possible.
“We decided with the team to move everything to next year, perhaps the card will be more suitable. … Everything is good, training continues.”
UFC 256 will now be headlined by a men’s Flyweight title fight as Deiveson Figueiredo will face Brandon Moreno, which will be just 20 days after they both competed at last weekend’s (Sat. Nov. 21, 2020) UFC 255 event.
Of course, if Yan has problems getting to Las Vegas, the promotion can always book the title fight as the co-main event for UFC 257 on Jan 23, 2021 on “Fight Island,” which will be headlined by a Lightweight bout between Conor McGregor and Dustin Poirier.
Just a thought.