Outside Source
Charles Oliveira isn’t taking any chances when it comes to his matchup with Beneil Dariush.
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The former lightweight champion revealed in a video on his Instagram stories Monday that a “small injury” kept him from preparing properly for what was originally supposed to be the UFC 288 co-main event on May 6. The bout has since been pulled from the card with plans to reschedule it for a future event.
“I wasn’t able to train, I got injured during wrestling practice,” Oliveira said in Portuguese (translation via MMAFighting.com). “I tried to train, I tried to do everything I could but we couldn’t, so we pulled out of the fight. [Fighting at UFC 288] would be great because I would be fighting on the same night of two teammates, ‘Willycat’ [Daniel Santos] and Rolando [Bedoya], but God knows all things. We’ll continue working and stay focused.”
Oliveira last appeared at UFC 280 in October, when he lost the lightweight belt to Islam Makhachev in a second-round submission defeat in Abu Dhabi. While Dariush has mentioned UFC 289 as a targeted landing spot for the fight, Oliveira did not provide a timetable for his return in the video.
“I have to stay [away from training] for a few days so I can go back to training soon, and then we’ll reschedule the fight,” Oliveira said. “I’ll be back to training pretty soon. That’s it, I had a small injury and decided to pull out so I wouldn’t fight injured. We’ve made that mistake once and I didn’t want to do it again. … We’re taking one step back so we can take one, two, three steps forward soon.”
Prior to his loss to Makhachev, Oliveira authored an 11-bout winning streak that included victories over the likes of Tony Ferguson, Michael Chandler, Justin Gaethje and Dustin Poirier. Dariush, meanwhile, is in the midst of an eight-fight winning streak and could be next in line for a title shot with a victory against “Do Bronx.”
This article first appeared at Recent News on Sherdog.com
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