For the first time in history, the UFC will take place in Serbia with local hope Uros Medic taking on stalwart Dan Rodriguez in the Welterweight division as the headline act.
The card will take place early on Sunday morning for us Aussies and I have put together all my opinions, including three expert UFC Fight Night betting plays, below.
Serbian Uros Medic won a UFC contract through Dana White’s Contender Series back in 2020.
He won his seventh fight from as many fights in his first contracted fight in the UFC, six of those wins were in the first round.
After a first round submission loss to Jalin Turner in his next fight he has gone 6-2 in his next eight including a first round KO win over Geoff Neal in February of this year.
Dan Rodriguez made his UFC debut the same year as his opponent but has had four more fights in the octagon.
The 39-year-old has wins over Mike Perry, Kevin Lee and Tim Means in his earlier years but comes into this fight on an impressive three fight win streak.
And they are over quality opponents in Alex Morono, Santiago Ponzinibbio and Kevin Holland.
He’s simply fought far better quality opponents than Medic, and despite his age, and the crowd rooting for their home town hero, I think he gets the job done.
They have given the main event to the local Serbian but there is no doubt Jan Blachowicz is the biggest star on this card.
This will be his 43rd professional MMA fight and he is of course a former UFC Light Heavyweight champion.
Blachowicz won the vacant title in 2020 by knocking out Dominick Reyes in the second round and then smothered Israel Adesanya when the then Middleweight champion rose a division in his quest to become a double champ.
The fact he is 43 years of age, has failed to win in his last four fights in the octagon and that he is facing a rising challenger does make this task difficult.
Navajo Sterling fights out of Citi Kickboxing with Eugene Bareman who coached Izzy when he fought Blachowicz which is something to take note of.
Sterling is just 28 years of age and brings a perfect 10-0 record into this fight but there is no doubting this is the biggest test of his short career.
But my goodness he hits hard.
Six of his 10 wins have been by knockout including his last two in the UFC and he just needs to land one big punch to end the fight.
This is another absolutely fascinating fight on a truly excellent card.
Aleksandar Rakic was cruelled by injury in the prime of his career after suffering a knee injury against Jan Blachowicz in 2022.
He had won all but one of his seven fights since making his UFC debut in 2017 before that injury and that included wins over Anthony Smith and Thiago Santos.
Now, having lost his last four in a row, his career is on the line in Serbia this weekend.
Marcin Tybura doesn’t look the perfect picture of what a professional fighter should look like but he has been a ranked fighter for a long period of time.
He has wins over Ben Rothwell, Tai Tuivasa and Blagoy Ivanov during his UFC career but he has lost his past two leading into this fight.
The move up to heavyweight may just be what Rakic needs and at his best he has too many weapons for his opponent.
I think he can get a finish inside two rounds.
