Brazil’s Michel Prazeres (26-2 MMA, 10-2 UFC) will welcome Austria’s Ismail Naurdiev (17-2 MMA, 0-0 UFC) to the UFC.
Promotion officials recently announced the welterweight matchup will take place at UFC on ESPN+ 3, which takes place Feb. 23 in the Czech Republic at O2 arena in Prague. The entire card streams live on ESPN+.
Prazeres was originally expected to face Ramazan Emeev, who was forced to withdraw from the contest with an undisclosed injury.
While Prazeres continues to push for an opportunity to return to lightweight after multiple misses at the scales, he instead takes his third consecutive matchup at welterweight. “Trator” currently boasts an impressive eight-fight winning streak and is 10-1 in his past 11 outings.
Naurdiev enters the UFC on just a two-fight winning streak, though both of those wins came via first-round knockout. The 22-year-old has been competing as a pro since he was just 16 and is a 13-1 in his past 14 appearances.
With the addition to the card, UFC on ESPN+ 3 now includes:
MAIN CARD (ESPN+, 11 a.m. ET)
- Jan Blachowicz vs. Thiago “Marreta” Santos
- Marcos Rogerio de Lima vs. Stefan Struve
- Gian Villante vs. Michal Oleksiejczuk
- Liz Carmouche vs. Lucie Pudilova
- John Dodson vs. Petr Yan
- Magomed Ankalaev vs. Darko Stosic
PRELIMINARY CARD (ESPN+, 8 a.m. ET)
- Veronica Macedo vs. Gillian Robertson
- Dwight Grant vs. Carlo Pedersoli Jr.
- Damir Hadzovic vs. Marco Polo Reyes
- Ismail Naurdiev vs. Michel Prazeres
- Chris Fishgold vs. Daniel Teymur
- Diego Ferreira vs. Rustam Khabilov
- Joel Alvarez vs. Damir Ismagulov
For more on UFC on ESPN+ 3, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.
