Charles Oliveira and Beneil Dariush will not be fighting at UFC 288 after all.
According to ESPN Deportes, Oliveira has suffered an injury and his fight against Dariush on May 6 at UFC 288 is off. The report states that the plan is to rebook the fight in the near future as Oliveira’s injury is described as minor but has kept him away from training for a few weeks.
Charles Oliveira (33-9) is coming off a submission loss to Islam Makhachev back at UFC 280 in October for the lightweight title. Prior to that, he submitted Justin Gaethje in the first round at UFC 274 but lost his belt on the scales as he missed weight.
Oliveira had won the vacant title with a KO win over Michael Chandler at UFC 262 in May of 2021 and then submitted Dustin Poirier to defend his belt for the only time. The Brazilian is currently the number one ranked lightweight and also holds notable wins over Tony Ferguson, Kevin Lee, Jim Miller, Clay Guida, and Jeremy Stephens among others.
Beneil Dariush (22-4-1) is on an eight-fight win streak and is coming off a decision win over Mateusz Gamrot at UFC 280. Prior to that, Dariush had picked up a decision win over Tony Ferguson. In his career, he holds notable wins over Diego Ferreira, Drakkar Klose, Jim Miller, Michael Johnson, and James Vick among others. Dariush, meanwhile, is currently ranked fourth at lightweight, and with a win over Oliveira at UFC 288, he likely would’ve gotten the next title shot.
With Oliveira vs. Dariush off UFC 288, the card is as follows:
- Aljamain Sterling vs. Henry Cejudo
- Jessica Andrade vs. Xiaonan Yan
- Drew Dober vs. Matt Frevola
- Kron Gracie vs. Charles Jourdain
- Khaos Williams vs. Rolando Bedoya
- Daniel Santos vs. Johnny Munoz Jr.
- Marina Rodriguez vs. Virna Jandiroba
- Devin Clark vs. Kennedy Nzechukwu
- Joseph Holmes vs. Claudio Ribeiro
- Ikram Aliskerov vs. Phil Hawes
- Zhalgas Zhumagulov vs. Rafael Estevam
- Parker Porter vs. Braxton Smith
What card would you like to see Charles Oliveira vs. Beneil Dariush be moved to?
