Could We See the UFC Return to Belfast?

With just a few months left in 2021, the UFC is clearly looking to close the year out with a bang. At the end of this month, UFC 267 will take place at the Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi, topped by Jan Blachowicz defending his light-heavyweight title against Glover Teixeira.

In the most prominent sportsbooks, UFC odds favor Blachowicz to hold onto his belt for a second time after successfully defending it against Israel Adesanya earlier this year.

The co-main event was initially supposed to be a rematch between Aljamain Sterling and Petr Yan after the latter lost his bantamweight title to Sterling when he was disqualified for an illegal knee. However, Sterling ruled himself out of the rematch due to ongoing injuries and has been replaced by top contender Cory Sandhagen.

Elsewhere on the bill rising lightweight star Islam Makhachev will take on Dan Hooker. Yan and Makhachev will enter those bouts as the betting favorites, but they are both intriguing matchups.

As the world’s leading mixed-martial arts (MMA) promotion, the UFC is very much a global operation and regularly operates in a variety of countries, including here in Northern Ireland, more specifically in Belfast.

The organisation first came to Belfast in 2007 with UFC 72, which took place at the SSE Arena (which was then known as the Odyssey Arena). The card was topped by a middleweight bout between Rich Franklin and Yushin Okami after Franklin’s original opponent, Martin Kampmann, withdrew from the fight due to injury.

At the time, there were not many Irish fighters active at the top end of the professional MMA world, let alone in the UFC, and so the show did not actually feature any, though there was still plenty of talent featured.

The event was a part of the UFC’s move to expand into Europe after two successful shows in England. UFC 72 was the company’s third show on the continent.

It would take nine years for the UFC to return to Belfast, though this time it was a notably bigger affair. Hosted at the same venue, the main event was booked as a welterweight clash between Dong Hyun Kim and Gunnar Nelson who, at the time, was a teammate of Irish superstar Conor McGregor.

However, that fight fell through and was instead replaced by a middleweight clash between Gegard Mousasi and Uriah Hall. Mousasi turned in a stellar performance to stop Hall in the first round.

Again, there wasn’t a huge amount of Irish talent on the bill though it was opened with the UFC debut of Charlie Ward, who was subsequently stopped by Abdul Razak Alhassan. Artem Lobov, another of McGregor’s teammates, picked up a win on the show and received an energetic pop from the crowd, who were delighted to see Conor in attendance at cageside.

What can’t be denied is the electric atmosphere inside the arena that night, displaying just how passionate Irish fans are about MMA and the UFC. Dublin’s McGregor can certainly be credited with some of that rise in popularity in Ireland and Northern Ireland, given his meteoric rise to the top of the sport.

The UFC hasn’t returned to Belfast since that 2016 card and while there are no immediate plans for them to come back to the city, their past successes here means it can never be ruled out.

In fact, they only need to look at the success of other MMA promotions in the region to see that there is a rich market here. Local girl Leah McCourt is on a successful run at Bellator, the UFC’s closest rival, and has already topped shows herself here as well as featuring on several big cards.

Likewise, West Tyrone’s James Gallagher has built a name for himself at the same promotion and has headlined in Ireland on numerous occasions. These shows are always packed with excited fans and continue to grow the MMA audience in this part of the world.

So, while the UFC doesn’t have a prominent Northern Irish fighter to build a card around to stage in Belfast, they have already proven that this isn’t strictly necessary for a show to be a success.

Neither of the previous UFC shows in Belfast have been centred around Irish talent, yet they still attracted large crowds and generated a lot of buzz. The company has now established itself in the UK and will surely be looking to stage more shows across England, Wales and Northern Ireland in the near future.

That being said, there would likely need to be something of a push from fans and fighters alike to get the UFC to return to Belfast. It might even take the rise of another fighter from the region.

The company is slightly limited in where it can stage shows across the globe at the moment, but it would be tough for them to resist a groundswell of support for another Belfast bonanza.