Gustaffson injured, out of UFC Fight Night 69, new main-event announced
There is a major change in the match card of UFC Fight Night 69 at Germany. The event is scheduled to take place in take place on June 20 at O2 World Berlin in Germany’s capital city. The entire event streams on UFC Fight Pass. The main-event set to take place between former light heavyweight title challengers Alexander Gustafsson (16-3 MMA, 8-3 UFC) and Glover Teixeira (22-4 MMA, 5-2 UFC). The injury sustained by Alexander Gustafsson has forced the match to be called off. Gustafsson is ranked No. 4 and Teixeira is No. 8 in the latest USA TODAY Sports/MMA junkie MMA light heavyweight rankings.
This fight will be replaced by another interesting brawl. This was a strawweight title fight between newly crowned champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk (9-0 MMA, 2-0 UFC) and Jessica Penne (12-3 MMA, 1-0 UFC).
Gustafsson was looking to bounce back from a January knockout loss to Anthony Johnson in a title eliminator. This 28-year-old was hoping to earn another title shot after a defeat at the hands of then-champ Jon Jones, who was stripped of his title earlier this week. Earlier last year, Gustafsson rebounded from his 2013 loss to Jones with a second-round TKO victory over Jimi Manuwa in early 2014 before falling short against “Rumble”.
The 35-year-old, Teixeira also is in a must-win situation both for his contender ship and his job security. The Brazilian made waves after winning his first five UFC fights and pushing his overall winning streak to 20 fights. However, he then suffered a title loss to Jones a year ago and followed it up with a lopsided unanimous-decision loss to Phil Davis in October.
There is no update on who the opponent of Teixeira will be and UFC has not provided any additional information on Gustafsson’s injury.
Jedrzejczyk, from Poland, won the title from inaugural champion Carla Esparza with a dominating second -round TKO at UFC 185 in March. She will put her 115-pound title on the line for the first time since she won it. The fight will be the first UFC title fight in Europe to take place outside the United Kingdom and the first UFC women’s title fight to take place in Europe.
Penne, the former Invicta atom weight champion, was expected to contend for the UFC’s first strawweight title on Season 20 of “The Ultimate Fighter.” But she lost to Esparza in the semifinals. Penne made her official UFC debut at the TUF 20 Finale in December and beat fellow semifinalist Randa Markos by split decision, picking up “Fight of the Night” honors in the process.
Let us have a look at the updated UFC Fight Night 69 card -
Joanna Jedrzejczyk vs. Jessica Penne – for strawweight title
Derek Brunson vs. Krzysztof Jotko
Alan Patrick vs. Mairbek Taisumov
Niklas Backstrom vs. Noad Lahat
Tatsuya Kawajiri vs. Dennis Siver
Nick Hein vs. Lukasz Sajewski
Scott Askham vs. Antonio dos Santos Jr.
Alan Omer vs. Mike Wilkinson
Piotr Hallmann vs. Magomed Mustafaev
Nikita Krylov vs. Marcos Rogerio de Lima
Makwan Amirkhani vs. Masio Fullen