Tony Ferguson will face Michael Chiesa on August 3rd at UFC Abu Dhabi.
UFC CEO Dana White announced two new fights for the promotion’s return to Abu Dhabi.
Legend and fan favorite Nick Diaz will fight Vicente Luque on August 3 in a 170-pound fight. Michael Chiesa and Tony Ferguson will also face off in a welterweight bout on the same card.
Diaz has competed just once since 2015. He lost a fight to Robbie Lawler at UFC 266 and had done some questionable interviews in the lead-up to the fight suggesting he didn’t actually want to be fighting. Lugue is coming off a second-round TKO loss to Joaquin Buckley in March.
White did say that this might be Tony Ferguson’s last fight, and I guess that’s all we can hope for. Tony had one of the biggest falls from grace we’ve ever seen in MMA. He went from a crazy 12-fight winning streak and being the biggest threat to Khabib Nurmagomedov, to getting absolutely shit kicked for seven fights in a row. That’s right, he’s lost seven fights back to back. Abu Dhabi could spell eight.
🚨 دانا وايت يعلن عن القائمة الرئيسية الكاملة لبطولة #UFCAbuDhabi لمدة 3 أيام:
كوري ساندهاجن 🆚 عمر نورماغوميدوف
نيك دياز 🆚 فيسنتي لوك
ديفيسون فيغيريدو 🆚 شيتو فيرا
ماكنزي ديرن 🆚 لوبي جودينيز
توني فيرغسون 🆚 مايكل كييزا pic.twitter.com/eTL3GsAVOk— mmamag.ma (@jamalsoussi10) May 29, 2024
Standing across from him is Michael Chiesa, who has been flirting with retirement for some time now. Chiesa has been doing his thing as an analyst, but he’s dusting off the old gloves to tangle with Tony. Michael is on a three-fight losing skid that started with D’arce loss to Vicente Luque in 2021, and ended with a D’arce loss to Kevin Holland in 2023. There’s a great chance that this is a double-retirement fight.
As for the rest of the undercard, Nick Diaz will also be returning to action to face ranked welterweight Vicente Luque. It does feel a bit strange to have Diaz and Ferguson on the same card without them competing against one another. Nick hasn’t won a fight since 2011, and Tony is on an abysmal 0-7 run. Also on the Abu Dhabi card, Marlon “Chito” Vera will throw down with former flyweight champ, Deiveson Figueiredo.
