Anderson Silva Says He’s Now Off UFC 212 Fight Card

According to Anderson Silva, he won’t be fighting at UFC 212 in Brazil on June 3rd after all.

“I really wanted to fight in Brazil, my country, but it’s not going to happen,” Silva told fans during a live video on Instagram on Sunday. “I want to apologize for this. I really wanted to fight here, but it didn’t happen. I think I was hurt in this, but that’s it.”

Last week Silva raised eyebrows when he angrily called out the UFC for not providing him with a suitable alternative to his originally scheduled fight with Kelvin Gastelum, which fell through when his opponent tested positive for marijuana.

On ‘The MMA Hour’ show with Ariel Helwani, the 42-year-old threatened to retire if the UFC didn’t give him an interim title shot with No.1 contender Yoel Romero at UFC 212 instead.

That fight didn’t really make sense given that Silva has only won once in his last six fights, and a few days later Dana White confirmed that there was no chance it was going to happen.

Calling Silva’s bluff, White also told TMZ that if the legendary fighter was even considering retirement, then perhaps he should just hang up his gloves.

It remains to be seen whether Silva will indeed follow through on his retirement threat, but certainly a UFC 212 fight now seems to have been ruled out.

The event will still proceed with several major fights though, including a featherweight title unification bout between Jose Aldo and Max Holloway, plus Vitor Belfort’s retirement fight against Nate Marquardt and Claudia Gadelha vs Karolina Kowalkiewicz.

Ross launched MMA Insight (previously FightOfTheNight.com) in 2009 as a way to channel his passion for the sport of mixed martial arts. He's since penned countless news stories and live fight reports along with dozens of feature articles as the lead writer for the site, reaching millions of fans in the process.