Khamzat Chimaev to fight Paulo Costa at UFC 294 in Abu Dhabi

Khamzat Chimaev vs Paulo Costa is official | UFC 294

Khamzat Chimaev will return to the Octagon on October 21 at UFC 294 in Abu Dhabi to face Paulo Costa.

UFC president Dana White announced the bout on Wednesday after the two fighters circled each other for almost a year. The match will be a part of a card headlined by a lightweight title rematch between Islam Makhachev and Charles Oliveira. There has not been any information on whether the Chimaev-Costa fight will be the co-main event.

Chimaev (12-0 MMA, 6-0 UFC) has not fought since September 2022 after sweeping Kevin Holland in the first round of UFC 279. He initially missed weight for his scheduled fight with Nate Diaz and was instead paired with Kevin Holland as a replacement.

Two weeks following the fight, “Borz” and his team discussed whether he should continue to fight at welterweight or move up to middleweight. White’s announcement confirmed that the Chechen-Swedish had decided to continue with the second option.

He will be looking to make a statement in his return against Costa (14-2 MMA, 6-2 UFC). The 29-year-old holds the UFC modern record for the fastest three-fight winning streak, which he achieved in 66 days.

Previous performances

Prior to the announcement, Chimaev denied rumors of a match against Costa. He said on Twitter that he had “a better opponent” planned for UFC 294.

Meanwhile, Costa immediately took to the blue platform to confirm the upcoming fight after the announcement.

“It’s OFFICIAL. I told you guys, I never lied. Abu Dhabi I’m bringing tha CHAOS to YOU ALL,” wrote Costa with pictures of Chimaev and himself.

Costa was initially scheduled to face Ikram Aliskerov at UFC 291 on July 29 in Salt Lake City, but he was pulled from the fight. As a replacement, Aliskerov (14-1 MMA, 1-0 UFC) will instead fight Nassourdine Imavov (12-4 MMA, 4-2 UFC) at UFC 294. It is not clear why the original matchmaking was canceled.

The Brazilian fighter is coming off a unanimous decision victory over Luke Rockhold at UFC 278 in August 2022. The win snapped his two-fight losing streak against Marvin Vettori and champion Israel Adesanya. Apart from these, he has won six of his eight UFC fights.