Aspinall to Defend Heavyweight Title Against Gane Following Jones’s Retirement

Tom Aspinall, the newly crowned undisputed heavyweight champion, is preparing to defend his title against Ciryl Gane of France at UFC 321 in Abu Dhabi on October 25. The fight was officially confirmed by Aspinall on Wednesday.

Aspinall, who held the interim title for the longest period in UFC history, was promoted to undisputed champion after Jon Jones, a legend in MMA, announced his retirement on June 21.

Tom Aspinall was the interim champion for 19 months because Jones declined to compete in a unification match.

The fight against Gane, 35, will occur 15 months following Aspinall’s first-round TKO victory over Curtis Blaydes at UFC 304 in July 2024.

The UFC has also revealed additional fights, such as Magomed Ankalaev, the light-heavyweight champion, defending his title at UFC 320 in Las Vegas on October 4 in a rematch with Alex Pereira.

Merab Dvalishvili of Georgia will compete against Cory Sandhagen of the United States on the same card, where his bantamweight title will be at stake.

Aspinall verified the match on Instagram. He captioned a fight poster with the phrase, “time to remind ’em”.

Jones won the heavyweight title in March 2023, and Aspinall won the interim title the previous year.

Despite repeated requests to fight Jones, Aspinall never had the opportunity, but his outstanding record of 15 victories and three losses in MMA, including 11 TKOs and an 8-1 UFC record, speaks for itself.

Gane, meanwhile, is a former UFC interim heavyweight champion who has twice lost the opportunity to win the undisputed title, once against Francis Ngannou in 2022 and again against Jones the following year.

Since his debut in 2019, Gane has won 10 of his 12 fights.