A heavyweight fight between Junior dos Santos and Jairzinho Rozenstruik has been booked for UFC 252 on August 15th at a destination still to be confirmed.
For JDS the fight comes at a time when he’s suffered back-to-back losses inside the Octagon, having been TKO’d by both Francis Ngannou and Curtis Blaydes in the past year.
Before that the 36-year-old had secured a trio of victories against Blagoy Ivanov, Tai Tuiavasa and Derrick Lewis, and as such he’s still ranked No.5 in the division heading into this fight.
Meanwhile, Rozenstruik had gone into his last fight with Francis Ngannou off the back of an impressive 10-0 start to his MMA career, which had included four finishes in a row due to strikes since joining the UFC, including a KO finish of Andrei Arlovski and TKO stoppage of Alistair Overeem.
That had led to the 32-year-old being earmarked as a potential title contender in the future if that form continued, but he only lasted 20 seconds before being KO’d by Ngannou, bringing his undefeated run to an abrupt end and leaving him positioned at No.6 on the heavyweight ladder.
Dos Santos vs. Rozenstruik joins a UFC 252 card that is expected to be headlined by heavyweight title fight between Stipe Miocic and Daniel Cormier.