Robert Whittaker to Face Paulo Costa at UFC 284 in February

Former Ultimate Fighting Championship beltholder Robert Whittaker is getting a local matchup for the first time in over three years.

Frequently rumored and discussed across the MMA community, the UFC officially confirmed that Whittaker (24-6) will be squaring off against Paulo Costa (14-2) at UFC 284. The two 185ers will toe the line at the RAC Arena in Perth, Australia, on Feb. 11. The promotion did state that the bout has not yet been cleared by the Western Australia Combat Sports Commission, but there do not appear to be any obstacles on paper for it coming together. It is the first fight set for this Australian event, which will be the UFC’s first journey to the Commonwealth of Australia since October 2019 – an event in which Whittaker headlined.

Whittaker bounced back from a close defeat to Israel Adesanya by beating Marvin Vettori on the scorecards in September. “Bobby Knuckles” moved up to the middleweight division after beating Mike Rhodes in 2014, and he rattled off eight straight wins including a pair of championship battles against Yoel Romero in 2017 and 2017. The New Zealand-born Aussie has only suffered losses in the weight class to Adesanya, while ratting off victories over the likes of Ronaldo Souza, Jared Cannonier, Derek Brunson and Kelvin Gastelum as he remained a perennial contender.

Brazil’s Costa too picked up a win in his last outing, outworking Luke Rockhold after three rounds in a wild and bloody scrap. Before then, Costa had dropped two straight, starting with a championship knockout loss to Adesanya and then losing a five-rounder to Vettori the year after. “Borrachinha” introduced himself to the UFC roster in 2017 by running roughshod over Gareth McLellan, and then went on to wreck Oluwale Bamgbose, Johny Hendricks and Uriah Hall in rapid succession. Although his 100% finish rate came to an end when he could not knock out Romero, he punched his ticket to the title shot with a spotless record of 13-0.