UFC 332: Silva vs Wang - Oct 3 🇺🇸

[wandshogun09]

Late getting this up, can you blame me? We’re off to Salt Lake City with this bag of wank…

PARAMOUNT+/CBS MAIN CARD
Natalia Silva vs Wang Cong - Vacant Flyweight Title 

Deiveson Figueiredo vs Payton Talbott 

King Green vs Esteban Ribovics 

Roberto Soldic vs Khaos Williams 

Roman Kopylov vs Ateba Gautier 

PARAMOUNT+ PRELIMS 
Alden Coria vs Imanol Rodriguez 

Damian Pinas vs Andrey Pulyaev 

Marcus McGhee vs Anthony Romero  

Anthony Wint vs Lucas Armand 

FIGHT PASS PRELIMS 
Mick Parkin vs Johnny Walker 

Rafael Dos Anjos vs Alexander Hernandez 

Ismail Naurdiev vs Marvin Vettori 

Jacobe Smith vs Bruce Whitehead 

Court McGee vs Eric Nolan 
 

 

Deary me. Alright. There is some good stuff on there. I’m not gonna completely shit on the whole card and pretend there’s nothing worth checking out there. Stuff like Green vs Ribovics, Soldic’s debut, couple of other bits and bobs and fighters I enjoy watching on there. There’s no getting away from it though, that main event is dead on arrival and I don’t think the co-main is great either considering how washed up Figgy has looked in his last handful of fights. Also worth mentioning that this show is in Utah so high altitude. So there’s a chance that even the fights that look decent end up suffering from that. I guess the best way to look at this is to just treat it as a Fight Night. If you look at it through that lens it’s actually a solid little card 🤣

 

 

Natalia Silva vs Wang Cong then. Yeah. Safe to say this isn’t gonna be as long and detailed a preview as I usually do for these numbered events. There’s just not much to this at all, is there? The fight itself I’m OK with. If it was a prelim or somewhere on the main card of a Fight Night or something. But as a title fight headlining the UFC’s ‘top tier’ of events? It’s just not hitting the spot. This was supposed to be Silva challenging the champ Valentina Shevchenko but Shevchenko suffered a back injury. Initially it was reported that she was stripped of the title but I’ve also read that she agreed to relinquish it to let the division move on while she recovers. Regardless, same end result. The title is vacant. And this is what the UFC came up with. Not ideal. I get Silva being involved, she was next in line for a crack at the gold anyway. It’s Wang Cong making this feel very prelim-ish for me. And that’s probably because five of her six fights in the UFC so far have been on the prelims.

I like Natalia Silva and not just because she’s a prime candidate for the ‘Hannah Fry’s Hot People’ thread on here. She has a likability beyond that for me and I really enjoyed her fights when she first came into the UFC and was on the rise. It wasn’t a who’s who of names initially but she beat Jasmine Jasudavicius in her debut, which is a decent win, and then scored a couple of highlight reel finishes over ham and eggers Tereza Bleda and Victoria Leonardo. Gradually she stepped up in competition and, since her Octagon debut back in 2022, she’s gone undefeated in the UFC at 8-0 with wins over the likes of former champions Jessica Andrade, Alexa Grasso and Rose Namajunas in her last three. She’s 29 years old, 20-5-1 now and hasn’t lost since 2017 in a promotion called Thunder Fights in Brazil. It’s been a while. Her last few fights haven’t been much fun to watch though. As she’s stepped up in levels, she’s still been winning fairly comfortable decisions but her performances haven’t blown anyone away. I vaguely remember thinking she looked good in the Grasso fight but the Namajunas fight last time out was arse.

China’s Wang Cong is 34 years old with a record of 10-1. She has a background in Kickboxing and Sanda but made the transition to MMA in the summer of 2022. At just 4-0 she got on Road To UFC and then made her UFC debut in August 2024, knocking out Victoria Leonardo in about a minute. Between the vicious and quick KO, which isn’t typical in the women’s Flyweight division, plus her whole Joker gimmick, she had a little bit more buzz around her than your average debuting 125lber. And it didn’t hurt that she had history with champ Shevchenko either. Her claim to combat sports fame was that she held a points win over Shev way back in 2015 in their Kickboxing days. The hype train came to a crashing halt before it even picked up any speed though, when Wang got dropped and submitted in just her second UFC fight by no hoper Gabriella Fernandes. She’s bounced back with four straight decision wins but, I don’t know, I’m not convinced she hasn’t already peaked. She’s coming off a win over Tracy Cortez on the McGregor vs Holloway 2 undercard in July in what I recall being a bit of a dud.

So there we are. Our main event. A title fight. Not gonna try to pretend I’m really looking forward to this but I’m hoping Silva wins. Neither as champ are gonna set the world alight but Silva’s more worthy of being in this position and I’m hoping she’ll be one of those fighters who steps their game up when they win the belt. At 34, there’s less upside in Wang anyway. They’d kind of have that storyline of doing Wang vs Shevchenko 2 but, even then, would anyone really care? It’s hardly Alex Pereira coming over from Kickboxing to MMA to haunt his old nemesis Israel Adesanya, is it? And like I said, Wang’s been mostly on the prelims in her UFC career, with a good chunk of her fights being on the early prelims on Fight Pass and stuff. Now we’re expected to buy into her as a headliner and title challenger? No-one would’ve given a shite about this anyway but it certainly doesn’t help that Wang hasn’t been positioned or promoted as a contender at all previously. She’s only ranked #6 and #8 on both sets of rankings as well. It feels like there had to be something better than this but then you look at the rankings and everyone’s either booked or injured. Oh well. At the very least I hope it’s a good fight. I’ll stick it on Sunday with my finger hovering over the fast forward button.

 

Deiveson Figueiredo vs Payton Talbott is a weird one. I’d have been really into this if they were both meeting in their primes but Figgy just looks like a bit of a spent force at this point. You know what the matchmakers are going for here. They’re looking to feed a once great champion in Figgy to their new prospect on the rise. It’s been the nature of combat sports forever. We’ve seen it so many times. I’m not even blaming the UFC. They badly need to build new guys up and one of the tried and tested ways to do that has always been to try to get them wins over established names and legends who are now on the decline. Give them ‘the rub’ to use a pro wrestling term. It’s still a bit sad to see though. I’d love to see Figgy turn back the clock and pull out a vintage performance but I don’t think he’s got one left. He’s gonna be 39 in December and he’s had his battles, his injuries, his rough weight cuts. It’s all miles on the clock. He’s gone 1-4 in his last five and I don’t think he’s looked good at all lately. Even the lone win, it was over Montel Jackson in a shitty fight and he only managed to scrape a split decision. He lost his last couple of fights against Umar Nurmagomedov and Song Yadong and Song subbed him last time out. He had the knee injury against Sandhagen last year. Just feels like he’s been done since that cracking fight with Petr Yan in Macau in 2024. He lost that one as well but it was the last time I felt like we got a glimpse of the Figgy of old. Talbott’s a decade younger at 28 and he’s 11-1 with 8 finishes. He had that loss to Raoni Barcelos in early 2025 but I’ve liked the way he’s responded. Thought he looked really good in his bounce back against Felipe Lima and he had no bother beating up Henry Cejudo in his last fight back in December. Cejudo was on the way out but Talbott still had a very strong performance and showed improvements in his wrestling. Yeah I don’t like this one for Figgy myself. Hopefully he at least makes a scrap of it but I’ve got a feeling there’ll be calls for him to retire after this one.

 

King Green vs Esteban Ribovics is a fight with no real stakes or relevancy to the Lightweight division but it should be fun to watch for however long it lasts. Green just turned 40 and this’ll be his 56th pro fight yet he’s still looking pretty sharp. He had those brutal back-to-back losses to Paddy Pimblett and Mauricio Ruffy in 2024/25 and I honestly thought that might be the end of him but, fair play, he’s clawed his way back, has won his last four fights in a row and finished his last three opponents. This year he’s stopped Daniel Zellhuber, subbed Jeremy Stephens and weathered the early storm of Terrance McKinney last time out in July and came back to TKO McKinney that same round. Argentina’s Ribovics is a decade Green’s junior at 30 years old and he’s 16-3 with 13 of his wins coming inside the distance. Not a future champ or anything but he’s been exciting to watch win or lose. He also has a win over McKinney, via brutal headkick in 2024, he had that FOTY contender against Zellhuber at the Sphere etc. He’s got his flaws and he came up short when he stepped up against Gamrot earlier this year. But he brings it. He’s coming off a TKO win over a shot to bits Edson Barboza at UFC 330 in August.

 

Roberto Soldic vs Khaos Williams. Wasn’t exactly spoilt for choice when it comes to fights worth highlighting on this card but this is ***WAND’S ONE TO WATCH*** here and it was an easy choice. This is the UFC debut of Soldic. His signing was announced in early September and it really stood out as one of the better and bigger signings the UFC has made in years. This along with Salahdine Parnasse coming in and one or two others, it does give me some hope that the UFC are actively trying to snap up the best fighters out there again. For a while they seemed to be in full-on penny pinching mode and lowballing the top name free agents. But lately they have been better at picking up some of those guys.

Soldic is Croatian, still just 31 years old so in theory he still probably has some time to make some noise in the UFC, and he’s 21-4-0-1 with 19 finishes, 18 by knockout. I admit I haven’t seen a ton of him but I’m familiar enough to be excited. Think it was Jim who said his fighting style is similar to Mirko Cro Cop and there’s definitely something to that. He hasn’t done too badly in MMA either. He was a two division champion in KSW at Welterweight and Middleweight. He was the last man to beat Dricus Du Plessis before DDP came to the UFC. They’re 1-1 against each other so the trilogy decider is right there somewhere down the road now they’re both in the UFC, although Soldic is coming in at 170 here so he’d have to go back up to 185 for that. He knocked DDP out in their last fight as well. Only man to do that. He also has a knockout win over Mamed Khalidov, who was widely regarded as one of the best fighters outside the UFC for years. And Soldic also fought Yaroslav Amosov back in 2016, losing by split decision. That’d be an interesting rematch now with both a decade more experienced. Khaos is 32 and 16-5 with 10 finishes, 9 by KO/TKO. He’s coming off a first round stoppage over Nikolay Veretennikov in May but had lost back-to-back fights before that. He’s not terrible, he’s usually entertaining to watch and he’s heavy handed. But he’s a guy a fighter the quality of Soldic should be beating. Who the fuck knows though in MMA? The x-factor here for me is that Soldic hasn’t fought since February 2025. So he’ll have been inactive for 18 months by the time the Octagon door shuts behind him. Not great. I’d still favour him but there’s potential for ring rust here. Hopefully he gets this one out of the way, wins spectacularly, and gets a few fights in to knock the cobwebs off. He could be a fantastic addition to the 170 and 185 divisions if he’s on form.

 

Roman Kopylov vs Ateba Gautier kicks off the main card. Interesting one this because it’s a fairly significant step up for Gautier. He came in off DWCS in 2025 and started smashing fools up in the UFC with ease. He made short work of bottom rung jobbers like Jose Medina, Robert Valentin and Tre’ston Vines. All first round demolition jobs where Gautier faced zero resistance. He looked a beast but the opposition was so shite you couldn’t put much stock in the wins. At UFC 324 in January he was taken the distance by Andrey Pulyaev, which was a bit of an eye opener because Pulyaev isn’t much good. Gautier still got the win and I don’t think he was ever in any real bother, but it was one of those performances where the hype cooled off. He returned to form in May with a second round walloping of Ozzy Diaz. But again, Diaz is shite so it didn’t tell us much. I like Gautier, he seems a good guy and he’s clearly got some potential. But while I initially was happy to see them take it slow with him, I’m at the point now where I wanna see him tested. Kopylov, on paper, could be that guy. He’s not amazing himself but he’s tough, he’s been subbed but he’s never been knocked out and he’s been in with the likes of Gregory Rodrigues, Paulo Costa and Fluffy Hernandez. He’s a guy who probably isn’t just gonna fall over as soon as Gautier touches him. There’s every chance Gautier still just blitzes him here but it feels like a fight that should give us some answers and an idea of where Gautier is at in his development so far.

 

Alden Coria vs Imanol Rodriguez could be a bit of a sleeper actually. They’re both relatively new in the UFC so it’s not a fight that instantly jumps off the page. But from what I remember of both, this could be a fun one. Coria’s 28 years old and has a record of 13-3 with 9 finishes. He made his UFC debut just over a year ago and has gone 3-0 since with wins over Alessandro Costa by TKO and then a couple of decisions over Luis Gurule and Stewart Nicoll. I remember him looking good in the Costa fight especially. Rodriguez is Mexican, 26 years old and undefeated at 7-0, all finishes. He scored a first round knockout on DWCS last October then made his UFC debut on the Mexico City card in February and stopped Kevin Borjas in a wild shootout.

 

Damian Pinas vs Andrey Pulyaev should be worth a look. Pinas has looked good (behave) in the UFC so far. He’s only 24 years old and he’s 10-1 with a 100% finish rate, mostly knockouts. He came in through DWCS and made his Octagon debut on the Mexico card in February, ironing out Wes Schultz in a round. He followed that with another first round KO over Cesar Almeida on the McGregor vs Holloway 2 card in July…

That was particularly impressive because, from what I can tell, Almeida had never been knocked out in MMA, or in his 57 fight Kickboxing career, which included a trilogy against Alex Pereira. Make no mistake, Pulyaev is being brought in as cannon fodder here. Whether it plays out like that we’ll see. We’ve seen that kind of matchmaking backfire in the past but Pulyaev is most likely getting chinned here. He’s 29 with a 10-5 record and just got the soul choked out of him by Nursulton Ruziboev in June. Eyes rolling into the back of his head, the lot. In fairness though, Pulyaev did manage to go the distance with Ateba Gautier, so maybe the matchmakers think he’ll give Pinas some rounds. I’m expecting a squash match though.

 

Marcus McGhee vs Anthony Romero is a last minute change. McGhee was supposed to fight Benardo Sopaj here but Sopaj dropped out on the Wednesday of fight week. In steps Romero on just three days notice. He’s 7-2 with 6 finishes and is the Bantamweight champion in a promotion called UNF apparently. He last fought in May when he scored a 25 second knockout. McGhee’s a likeable guy and a decent fighter. At 36 he most likely doesn’t have a ton of time left in the sport. He’s 11-2 now and his record is a bit of an odd one. He came into the UFC in 2023 and started the usual climb against lower-middle of the pack level opposition. He stopped Journey Newson, JP Buys and Gaston Bolanos in his first few fights. He got a bit of a step up and beat Jonathan Martinez on points. Then in July 2025, he was just randomly thrown in with Petr Yan of all people. It was a big opportunity and it wasn’t like he performed badly, but he lost a clear decision and that was that. He dropped right back down in levels last time and won a decision against John Yannis. Now here we are.

 

Anthony Wint vs Lucas Armand. Not a clue on this. Wint just turned 31 years old in mid September and he’s undefeated at 8-0 with 7 not making it to the judges scorecards. All sounds good but he’s untested so far. I’ve seen the grand total of one fight of his. He made his UFC debut on the Sacramento card in August and won via easy first round submission. But his opponent Terrance Chatman was also making his debut and looked utter shite so it wasn’t a win you can gauge anything on. Wint certainly looks the part physically though. The man’s a tank. But he’s up against another newcomer here. Armand’s 30 and also unbeaten at 6-0 with 5 finishes. He actually went to a fourth round in his last fight in March and got the TKO late. Whatever that’s worth. Hopefully it’s watchable but it’s Heavyweight MMA. Watch at your own peril.

 

Mick Parkin vs Johnny Walker is one of those fights that sounds like it could be both hilarious and horrendous in equal measures. The Heavyweight debut of Johnny Walker. Is it just me or does this sound like a terrible idea? Walker’s a guy who’s become a bit of a meme solely because of how he gets knocked out. Chances are, if it’s a Johnny Walker fight week, you’re more likely to see highlight reels of him getting sparked than you are seeing edits of him actually winning. And that guy, not known for his durability, is now moving up to a weight class where the opponents are bigger and hit harder? There’s always the counter argument that maybe him not cutting down to 205 will make him more durable. But I’m not feeling it. He’s a big fucker. He’s always been at the bigger end of the size scale at 205. I can see the logic in him moving up when you look at his frame and him being mid 30s now. But I don’t know. It’s probably not gonna end well for him. Not sure this will be the fight that highlights that but we’ll see. I don’t particularly rate Parkin. There was a time when it seemed like fans were pushing him as some hot prospect but I’ve never really bought into it myself. He turns 31 the day before this show, a toddler by Heavyweight standards really. And he’s 10-1, coming off his first loss to Marcin Tybura, followed by an 18 month layoff. I don’t have a clue what to expect out of this one.

 

Rafael Dos Anjos vs Alexander Hernandez. Christ. I don’t like this. As a long time fan of RDA, I was quietly hoping he’d just decided to retire. We last saw him in October 2024, blowing his knee out in 90 seconds and losing to Geoff Neal. That was the same card as Topuria vs Holloway. Feels like an age ago. And RDA was 40 then. Now he’s coming back, just a few weeks shy of 42, after a two year layoff? Yeah I don’t have a good feeling about this. That felt like the universe was trying to send him a message that it was time to pack it in, and he’s ignored it. A great fighter in his day, former champ, ripped the title off prime Anthony Pettis, beat Cerrone twice, stopped Bendo, beat Nate, beat Lawler etc. It’s over though. It’s been over for a while. And I hate that he’s probably gonna lose to a twat like Hernandez. A guy RDA would’ve dog walked at his best. Feel like this is gonna be a real downer moment on the card.

 

Ismail Naurdiev vs Marvin Vettori is whatever. Not a bad fight, especially considering it’s on the Fight Pass bit, but it doesn’t really move me one way or the other. Feels like Vettori is just going through the motions at this point. I’m sure he was making noises about retiring not long ago. He’s still only 33, not a spring chicken but not an old man either. But he’s coming into this fight having gone 1-5 in his last 6 and he’s lost his last four in a row. He was never tippy top level but the guy who challenged Adesanya for the title and had that five round war against Paulo Costa (underrated forgotten fight) seems like a distant memory now. Naurdiev’s 30 years old and 25-8 with 19 finishes. Nothing special from what I remember of him but Vettori seems so faded and checked out at this point, Naurdiev might beat him. He’s coming off a devastating first round KO win over Ryan Loder here.

 

Jacobe Smith vs Bruce Whitehead has been chucked onto the card pretty much at the last minute. Weird one really because Smith was actually booked to fight Kevin Holland back in July but it fell apart. If they were stepping him up against Holland there, you’d think they’d still be looking at similar names for him. But here we are and he’s facing a complete UFC newcomer. Smith’s a guy the UFC seem high on and the commentators are always pushing him as some can’t miss prospect. He’s 30 years old and undefeated at 12-0 with 10 finishes. He’s looked good so far. Although his last fight really soured me on him big time…

He bashed up Josiah Harrell in a round back in February and, as you can see there, took fucking liberties with extra punches at the stoppage. I recall the commentators heaping the blame on the ref for that but for me Smith was as much in the wrong, and probably more in the wrong. He was still punching after the ref put his hands on them to stop the fight. A proper cunt move however you spin it. Never heard of this Whitehead fella but I hope he somehow pulls off the upset. He’s 29 with a record of 8-2 with 5 finishes. He’s fought exclusively for Fury FC so far.

 

Court McGee vs Eric Nolan jerks the curtain. Man, Court McGee is still knocking about? I thought for sure this has to be it for him, then I saw an article saying he’s not even thinking about retirement. Jesus. He’s 41 years old now but he might as well be 81. Feels like he’s been on the roster forever. He won TUF back in 2010, for fuck’s sake. The season coached by Chuck Liddell and Tito Ortiz. He’s gotta be one of the longest serving active fighters in the UFC at this point. I know there’s one or two who’ve been there longer. Jim Miller for one. But he must be near the top of the list. He’s 24-14 now, has lost four of his last five and he dropped a decision against Michael Chiesa in his last fight over a year ago. Chiesa has retired since then and McGee is still here. Nolan’s 29 years old and 8-5 with 6 finishes. He’s 0-2 in the UFC so far. Feels like a real litmus test to see what McGee has left. If he loses to a guy like this, what are we even doing anymore?

 

 

332…

Edited 4 hours ago by wandshogun09

[Dai]

Great write up Wand. When they have had the promo graphic up for this main event on the cards just gone, it blew my mind every time. Must be the worst numbered main event of all time. Think I checked when you posted it in the fight announcement thread where this was being held. I'm sure it was 18,000 capacity. For this! Seeing 18k people watching a Fight Night prelim headliner as the top bout will be surreal.

 

RDA was considered the P4P best at one point, I think (unless Jones was still about). He must be one of very few people on the entire roster who can say they have been the P4P best, or even still 2nd best P4P.