Two major welterweight fights have been added to the UFC 207 event in Las Vegas on December 30th, with former champion Johny Hendricks set to fight Neil Magny, while Matt Brown will lock horns with Tarec Saffiedine.
The 33 year-old Hendricks is in dire need of a moral-boosting win after losing three of his last four fights in the Octagon.
The rot began when he lost the 170lb title to Robbie Lawler in their rematch at tha tail end of 2014. While ‘Bigg Rigg’ appeared to get back on track with a win over Matt Brown after that, he has since slumped to back-to-back defeats against Stephen Thompson at UFC Fight Night 82 and then Kelvin Gastelum at UFC 200.
Magny will also be coming off a loss, having been TKO’d in the first round by Lorenz Larkin at UFC 202 in August, but unlike Hendricks, he was actually on a three-fight winning streak prior to that, taking out a string of quality competition in Erick Silva, Kelvin Gastelum and Hector Lombard.
As for the other match-up, veteran campaigner Matt Brown’s unexpectedly impressive run of form that saw him deliver a seven-fight winning streak between 2012-2014 is now feeling like an increaasingly distant memory as he’s won just once in his last five outings.
Along the way he’s suffered defeat against a number of top contenders like Robbie Lawler, Johny Hendricks, Demian Maia and most recently Jake Ellenberger, with his solitary victory during this tough spell coming against Jordan Mein in July of last year.
He’ll now fight former Strikeforce welterweight champion Saffiedine, who’s only fought four times since joining in January of 2014 due to being held back by a number of injury woes.
However, the 30 year-old appears to have put that behind him now as this will mark his third fight in 2016, having defeated Jake Ellenberger in January, followed by a loss to Rick Story in May.
Hendricks Vs Magny and Brown Vs Saffiedine join a UFC 207 card that’s set to be headlined by the return of Ronda Rousey against woman’s bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes.
