ABU DHABI – The UFC 280 pre-fight news conference took place Thursday and the final six matchups on the card were in attendance to answer questions.
At the conclusion of the festivities, the entire main card, which airs on pay-per-view, and the featured prelims, which air on ESPNews and ESPN+, participated in some traditional staredowns.
Both championship fights were locked in, but so were the remaining pairings, including a bantamweight title eliminator of Petr Yan (16-3 MMA, 8-2 UFC) vs. Sean O’Malley (15-1 MMA, 7-1 UFC), a key lightweight bout of Beneil Dariush (21-4-1 MMA, 15-4-1 UFC) vs. Mateusz Gamrot (21-1 MMA, 4-1 UFC), a potential women’s flyweight title eliminator of Katlyn Chookagian (18-4 MMA, 11-4 UFC) vs. Manon Fiorot (9-1 MMA, 4-0 UFC), and a critical welterweight clash of Belal Muhammad (21-3 MMA, 12-3 UFC) vs. Sean Brady (15-0 MMA, 5-0 UFC).
The staredowns featured a range of emotions. Watch the video of the four non-title faceoffs above.
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 280.