UFC is headed to Canada for its first pay-per-view card of the new year. UFC middleweight champ Sean Strickland and Dricus du Plessis are on the marquee. The feud has quickly unraveled into chaos and comes to a head at UFC 297 in Toronto’s Scotiabank Theatre on Jan. 20.
Strickland vs. du Plessis seemed incident-free upon its announcement. That all changed at a press conference held during UFC 296 fight week. The headliners got into a tasteless back-and-forth evoking homophobic slurs and banter about child abuse. The bad blood boiled over at UFC 296 when Strickland and Du Plessis brawled in the crowd.
Overshadowed by the drama is UFC 297’s second title fight. Raquel Pennington and Mayra Bueno Silva compete for the vacant UFC women’s bantamweight championship. The title was vacated after former two-division champion Amanda Nunes retired following a successful title defense against Irene Aldana at UFC 289 in another major Canadian city, Vancouver.
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