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Magomed Ankalaev Vs. Alex Pereira Preview

Originally posted on BoxingNews.com | Last updated Sep 29, 2025 11:18 AM ET

Magomed Ankalaev defends his UFC Heavyweight Title against Alex Pereira on October 4, as we preview the upcoming fight.

Ankalaev won the first fight via a unanimous decision at UFC 313, giving Alex his first loss at the weight class, as he was no longer the champion. Anakalev’s team accused Alex of greasing despite the win, something which Pereira denied. Since then, the two fighters have accused each other of ducking, with Alex saying a third fight won’t happen, suggesting he is confident of getting a win. Following Carlos Ulberg’s KO win over Dominick Reyes, the winner of Pereira-Ankalaev could face Ulberg next.

Pre-Fight

“To be honest with you, I went through a lot when I was fighting for the title. That training camp was terrible, I couldn’t wrestle for the most part of the training camp, I was battling a lot of injuries and there was a lot of reasons. Also, I told my coach right away during the rounds that I felt like he was greased. He was just too slippery. These things happen in professional sport, I’m not accusing him of anything, but that’s just what I felt. I spar every day, I train every day, you can feel when people are slippery. It’s too much slippery. So I felt he was too greasy and that played a role also,” Ankalaev stated

“Dealing with a loss is not cool. But honestly, if I put together everything that was going on with me, and I’m not gonna say it right now, it makes me happy that I was able to do the fight that I did with everything that was going on with me. Honestly, I was about 40% for that fight, on that night. And obviously it’s gonna be much more this time. If I’m only 50%, that 10% is gonna make such a great difference. I’m gonna leave no doubt for everybody,” Pereira said