Injury Ejects Geoff Neal From Jan. 14 UFC Bout With Shavkat Rakhmonov

The first Ultimate Fighting Championship show of the new year has taken a big hit.

According to reporter Igor Lazorin on Thursday morning, Geoff Neal (15-4) has suffered an injury and has been forced out of his pairing with Shavkat Rakhmonov (16-0) at UFC Fight Night 217. The two welterweights were set to toe the line in the co-headliner of the UFC Vegas-based event on Jan. 14. Per Lazorin, the promotion is looking to find a new opponent for the top-10 170-pounder Rakhmonov. Neal, however, confirmed this news, while stating that he seeks keeping the fight together and pushing it to a later date.


“Fights [sic] off people…looking to rebook Shavkat later. Nobody’s scared,” Neal wrote on Facebook shortly after the news broke.

Neal was aiming to lift a two-fight win streak to three straight, as he had previously topped Santiago Ponzinibbio at the end of 2021 and came back in mid-2022 to knock Vicente Luque out. “Handz of Steel” was intent on derailing the hype train and unbeaten record of his opponent, having said in a recent interview with MMA Junkie that he would “take the win…easy.” Making his promotional debut in 2018 after claiming a contract on the first season of Dana White's Contender Series, Neal has scored five stoppages across his seven wins, notably putting away Luque as well as Niko Price and Mike Perry on his way up.

Kazakhstan’s Rakhmonov has yet to taste defeat as a professional, ratting off 12 wins in his first years in the sport before joining the UFC in 2020. Since then, “Nomad” has kept his dominant ways intact, stopping Alex Oliveira, Michel Prazeres, Carlston Harris and Neil Magny one after the other as he surged into contendership. Rakhmonov has only been to the third round one time as a pro, and he celebrates an equal number of knockouts to submissions on his ledger.

UFC Fight Night 217 will carry on at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, in a card capped off by a middleweight throwdown between Nassourdine Imavov and Kelvin Gastelum. If the promotion cannot find a new opponent to face Rakhmonov, the new co-headliner will likely come in the form of a middleweight clash between Punahele Soriano and Roman Kopylov. Additional main card tilts include Dan Ige vs. Damon Jackson at featherweight, flyweights Jimmy Flick and Charles Johnson battling it out and Ketlen Vieira taking on Raquel Pennington in the women’s 135-pound class.