Dominant women’s flyweight champion Valentina Shevchenko is set to defend the title against Alexa Grasso in the co-main event of UFC 285 on March 4th in Las Vegas.
The 34-year-old Shevchenko is currently unbeaten in her last nine fights and has already amassed seven successful defenses of her flyweight title over the past three-and-a-half years.
Along the way she’s defeated a who’s who of the 125lb division, including the likes of Joanna Jedrzejczyk, Jessica Andrade, Katlyn Chookagian and Liz Carmouche. However, she was given her toughest test to date in her last fight when Taila Santos exceeded expectations to put ‘Bullet’ in real danger of losing her belt, though the champion eventually emerged with a narrow split decision victory.
Now she goes up against the 29-year-old Grasso, who has finally started to live up to expectations in the UFC since moving up to 125lbs after an indifferent 3-2 spell at strawweight to start her time in the promotion.
Since then she’s gone on a four-fight winning streak, beating the likes of Ji Yeon Kim, Maycee Barber, Joanne Wood and most recently Viviane Araujo to earn a shot at the flyweight title.
Shevchenko vs. Grasso will serve as the lead-in to the eagerly anticipated UFC 285 main event, which will see Jon Jones finally return to make his heavyweight debut against Ciryl Gane in a battle to establish the division’s new champion after the departure of Francis Ngannou.
