UFC London undercard overview: English fighters in spotlight

There will be a strong contingent of English talent this weekend when the UFC returns to London for a 14-bout Fight Night card at the O2 Arena.

In addition to Manchester’s Lerone Murphy, who faces Russia’s Movsar Evloev in Saturday’s featherweight main event, nearly half the card is composed of fighters competing on home soil.

Every single matchup features at least one fighter from Europe and a dozen fighters set to compete are either English-born and/or fight out of England.

Lightweight star Paddy Pimblett isn’t on the card, but he’ll be in the building, helping support his Next Generation MMA Liverpool teammate Luke Riley, who’s featured in the co-main event.

Riley, 26, is a touted featherweight who improved to 12-0 in mixed martial arts when he finished Bogdan Grad in November. It was Riley’s UFC debut, so the fact he has been placed in a co-main event spotlight in just his second appearance in the organization speaks to his star potential. Riley is facing American Michael Aswell Jr., who’s coming off a first-round knockout win in October.

An all-English matchup between Michael “Venom” Page and Sam Patterson is featured on the main card. It’s a bizarre matchup for Page, 38, who is returning to 170 pounds after back-to-back wins at 185 pounds over Shara Magomedov and Jared Cannonier in 2025. In the other corner, Patterson, 25, has been on a roll since moving up to 170 pounds from 155 pounds. Patterson hasn’t lost in three years and has finished his past four UFC opponents in the opening round.

Middleweight Christian Leroy Duncan will be looking for his fourth consecutive win when he faces Georgia’s Roman Dolidze. Leroy Duncan has won five of his past six overall and has stopped his past two opponents with spinning techniques. The 30-year-old from Gloucester began his perfect 2025 campaign with a decision over Andrey Pulyaev last March in London before earning Performance of the Night bonuses for his highlight knockouts of Eryk Anders in August and Marco Tulio in November.

Featherweight Kurtis Campbell and strawweight Shanelle Dyer were among the 2025 graduates of Dana White’s Contender Series, each earning a UFC contract in September, and both are set for their debuts on the prelims. Campbell, 23, is 8-0 and faces 10-2 American Danny Silva, while Dyer faces Brazil’s Ravena Oliveira.

Mario Pinto is Portuguese but lives, trains and fights out of England. He is 11-0 and was originally scheduled to face England’s Mick Parkin, however, due to injury Parkin was removed from the bout and replaced by Felipe Franco, who will be making his UFC debut. The 25-year-old Brazilian newcomer enters the weekend coming off two first-round knockout wins at Brazilian regional shows.

Pinto is off to a 2-0 start to his UFC career, with stoppage wins over Austen Lane and Jhonata Diniz in March and October 2025. Franco is 10-1 in MMA, with all of his wins via stoppage, and his lone loss a submission to Freddy Vidal in a short-notice Contender Series matchup this past September.

Scotland’s Louie Southerland trains in England and is set to go against Australia’s Brando Pericic in the card’s only other heavyweight contest.

Nathaniel Wood is riding the third separate three-fight winning streak of his UFC tenure as he meets touted Belgian-Guinean star Losene Keita. Wood was born in London and is 4-0 in the UFC when fighting in the city. Keita missed weight for the first time in his career ahead of his scheduled UFC debut in September. The 28-year-old missed weight by three pounds ahead of a matchup with Patricio “Pitbull” Freire at UFC Paris and the bout was cancelled.

Shaqueme “Shem” Rock, another Next Generation MMA Liverpool team member, fell short in his UFC debut in November but can bounce back with a win over Abdul-Kareem Al-Selwady this weekend.

Melissa Mullins opens the card against Brazil’s Luana Carolina, who doesn’t have the best history in London. Half of Carolina’s UFC losses have occurred at London’s O2 Arena, including an infamous 2022 spinning elbow knockout loss to Molly McCann.

Unbeaten fighters

Headliners Evloev and Murphy are 19-0 and 17-0-1, respectively, but aren’t the only unbeaten fighters on the card this week. Five other UFC London athletes have yet to face defeat in professional MMA.

As mentioned above, Riley, Campbell and Pinto are looking to stay perfect, as are Poland’s Iwo Baraniewski and France’s Axel Sola.

Baraniewski improved to 7-0, thanks to his thrilling barnburner of a UFC debut in December.

All seven of Baraniewski’s wins have been via stoppage — five by KO/TKO and two by submission — while his opponent, America's Austen Lane, is 13-7 in MMA. Lane has been finished by KO/TKO six times and submitted once.

Sola is 11-0-1 and paired with lightweight Mason Jones of Wales. Jones has won six in a row and coming off the best win of his UFC career, a TKO of Bolaji Oki six months ago. Sola has decent boxing and used body work to stop Rhys McKee in September to earn his first UFC victory.

Saturday's card will be the 17th UFC event held in London in the organization’s history. Below is the projected bout order (subject to change):

Main card

-- Movsar Evloev vs. Lerone Murphy (five rounds)

-- Luke Riley vs. Michael Aswell

-- Michael Page vs. Sam Patterson

-- Iwo Baraniewski vs. Austen Lane

-- Roman Dolidze vs. Christian Leroy Duncan

-- Kurtis Campbell vs. Danny Silva

Preliminary card

-- Mason Jones vs. Axel Sola

-- Nathaniel Wood vs. Losene Keita

-- Mario Pinto vs. Felipe Franco

-- Mantas Kondratavicius vs. Antonio Trocoli

-- Louie Sutherland vs. Brando Pericic

-- Shaqueme “Shem” Rock vs. Abdul-Kareem Al-Selwady

-- Shanelle Dyer vs. Ravena Oliveira

-- Melissa Mullins vs. Luana Carolina