A welterweight fight between former title contenders Gilbert Burns and Stephen Thompson has been announced for UFC 264 on July 10th.
The 34-year-old Burns is coming off a loss in his attempt to take the 170lb title from Kamara Usman’s grasp, suffering a third round defeat by TKO.
That brought an end to Burns six-fight winning streak during which he’d defeated the likes of Gunnar Nelson, Damien Maia and Tyron Woodley to emerge as the division’s top contender.
Now the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu ace will go up against one of the division’s premier strikers in ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson, who has only fought twice in the past two years, but has picked up wins on each occassion, earning unanimous decision victories over both Vicente Luque and Geoff Neal.
That leaves Thompson ranked No.5 in the division, just three places below the No.2 ranked Burns, so both fighters will see this as an opportunity to push towards another shot at the belt.
There’s no confirmation yet on whether Burns vs. Thompson will get co-main event status, but it does join a UFC 264 card that is now expected to be headlined by a blockbuster trilogy fight between Dustin Poirier and Conor McGregor, which automatically makes it one of the biggest events of the year.
