Alexander Volkanovski and Aljamain Sterling both defended their titles at UFC 273.
Volkanovski was challenging MMA veteran The Korean Zombie as he looked to make the third defence of his featherweight title at the event. The Australian had an excellent first round and was visibly quicker than Zombie, opening up a cut on the Korean's face early on.
Zombie had a better start to the second round and was countering Volkanovski well, but was soon dropped by a big punch from the champion. The Korean was a step behind Volkanovski to every punch, with the challenger being dropped and almost finished at the end of third round.
At the start of the fourth round, Volkanovski landed a huge flurry that wobbled Zombie. Referee Herb Dean rightfully stopped the fight before Zombie went down to save him from any unnecessary punishment.
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In the co-main event, Aljamain Sterling outpointed Petr Yan in their bantamweight title fight rematch. The pair first fought at UFC 259 last year when Yan was disqualified for landing an illegal knee having dominated most of the fight up until the stoppage.
Yan was overly aggressive in the first round and uncharacteristically put his technique aside as he headhunted his rival. Sterling spent the whole second round on Yan's back landing ground and pound and searching for a rear-naked choke.
The third round was much the same as Yan gave up his back again to Sterling in a desperate attempt to avoid being taken down. Yan responded well by dominating the fourth round and the fight was still up for grabs for either fighter in the last round.
Sterling continued to try and take Yan down but the Russian defended his attempts and landed his own ground and pound. The Russian edged the last round, but the judges saw it 48-47, 47-48 and 48-47 in favour of Sterling.
Before the title fights, rising star Khamzat Chimaev went the distance for the first time in his career as he outpointed Gilbert Burns. The Chechen had his work cut out for him and was dropped on several occasions in the fight.
From the beginning to the final bell, Chimaev never slowed down and his pace was too much for No.2 ranked Burns. The 27-year-old remains unbeaten and UFC boss Dana White says Colby Covington is next in line for him.
Elsewhere on the UFC 273 card, Mackenzie Dern pushed herself one step closer to a strawweight title shot by outpointing Tecia Torres. On the prelims, Irish prospect Ian Garry picked up his second UFC win by outpointing Darian Weeks in an underwhelming fight.
