Former bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling announced his withdrawal from his bout against Movsar Evloev due to an injury.
Aljamain Sterling disclosed this news in a YouTube video, explaining his displeasure for dropping out of the fight.
“Unfortunately, I have to break the news I will not be competing in Salt Lake City at UFC 307,” Sterling said. “In sparring, I had an injury not requiring surgery, but I was advised by the UFC medical staff that I will not be able to properly compete in this short of a turnaround.
“I did the stem cells. I took time off. and I tried to rehab it as much as I can, as best as I can with the [UFC Performance Institute] team here, and unfortunately, it’s out of my hands now. and I apologize to Movsar and his team. We’ve been talking and I was really looking forward to punching this guy in his face.”
Although the injury doesn’t require surgery, the fighter isn’t responding to treatment, which is the major reason for his withdrawal. Sterling apologized to his opponent and asked for the matchup to be rebooked for a later date.
“Movsar, if you still really want to punch this handsome face, I put the challenge out to you to push the fight back and wait,” Sterling said. “Wait for daddy. I will be back soon. Possibly do this in December. That’s pretty much all I got.
“If you decide not to wait, I can respect that also because you’re trying to fight for a belt, as am I. The only way to do that is to go through each other.”
Despite Sterling’s apology, it seems Evloev eager to maintain his spot on the card and will look up another challenger.
“ I see Aljamain announced on his YouTube channel that he is out of the fight. I’ve been training for four months and would like to stay on this card and fight anybody. I’m not sure if the UFC can find someone to fight me but I worked really hard for this fight.”
Evloev says he will fight anybody and calls out Diego Lopes to fill in the short-notice fight.
“Hey, if you wanna defend your honor, you have 2.5 weeks to try and get this loss off your record.” Evloev wrote to Lopes on X (formerly Twitter).”
Lopes didn’t seem interested in the fight and responded, “You had your chance a few months ago when I called you to fight. Now you sit back and watch as the bus leaves you waiting,”
Notwithstanding this rejection. Evloev is still hopeful of a replacement before the fight date.
