Jan Blachowicz v Aleksandar Rakic rebooked for UFC on ESPN 33

A huge light-heavyweight match has been confirmed; Jan Blachowicz and Aleksandar Rakic have been rebooked to meet in the main event of the May 14th Fight Night event, following the collapse of their initially scheduled matchup on March 26th.

Jan Blachowicz v Aleksandar Rakic confirmed by sources close to the fighters – but not by the UFC

Two people close to the fighters confirmed to MMA Junkie that the matchup is agreed to and will take place. However, they requested to remain anonymous since the UFC have not made an official announcement to the public as of yet; it is believed that the first person to confirm the news was someone close to Aleksandar Rakic’s camp.

Rakic (14-2 MMA, 6-1 UFC) is coming off of back to back decision victories over two former light-heavyweight title challengers: Thiago “Marreta” Santos and Anthony “Lionheart” Smith respectively. Since losing his professional debut in 2019, which was a split decision loss to Volkan “No Time” Oezdemir, Rakic has gone on to win 14 of his last 15 professional fights. Contrastingly, Jan Blachowicz (28-9 MMA, 11-6 UFC) will be hoping to bounce back from losing his light-heavyweight crown to Glover Teixeira in his last outing at UFC 267 in October.

With Glover Teixeira set to defend his newly gained crown against Jiri Prochazka in Singapore (in a card also featuring Valentina Shevchenko defending her flyweight crown against Talia Santos), this fight could have big ramifications for the title picture. A big win over a contender like Rakic puts Blachowicz right back in the title frame at the top of the division, whilst a win for Rakic would see him make a strong argument for getting the next shot at the winner of Glover Teixeira and Jiri Prochazka.

Who do you see winning this light heavyweight war?