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Belal Muhammad Replaces Khamzat Chimaev to Take on Leon Edwards at UFC Vegas 21

Published 02/18/2021, 11:59 PM EST

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 A top talent in the UFC welterweight division, Leon Edwards, sits at #3 in the divisional rankings. However, he is not close to a title shot as he has been inactive for almost 18 months. 

The Briton has had a frustrating 2020. Although he was willing and able to fight, circumstances out of his control forced the 29-year-old to sit out for the whole year as he watched others in the division advance. This obviously did not sit well with ‘Rocky’ who is on an eight-fight win streak at the moment. 

After his fight with Chimaev fell out for the third time, Leon was open to fight anyone and called out multiple fighters in the welterweight division. His opponent at UFC Fight Night on March 13th is not someone many fans would have expected. Leon Edwards will take on Belal Muhammad in the main event. 

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Read: Alexander Volkanovski promises to pressure and finish Brian Ortega in mid-rounds 

Leon Edwards will be back in the octagon after almost two years out 

Edwards was initially set to take on ‘Borz’ as the main event on the final card of 2020 for the UFC. However, a positive COVID test ruled him out of the fight. The fight was rescheduled for January 20th on Fight Island. This time around it was Chimaev who pulled out due to a positive COVID test. 

March 13th was then booked as the date the two men would finally face off. However, Dana White recently confirmed that lingering effects of COVID-19 meant that Chimaev was not fully fit yet. Hence, the booking made it to the scrap heap for the third and final time. 

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With Chimaev out, it is understood that the UFC was working on making a fight between ‘Chaos’ and ‘Rocky’. The fight made sense given that they’re ranked number one and three, respectively.

However, Covington turned down the fight as he stated he is not interested in doing charity work and insisted on fighting for the belt or nothing else. 

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Remember The Name’ who just secured an impressive unanimous decision win last weekend, steps in on short notice to take on arguably his toughest test to date in the UFC. 

What do you make of the fight between Muhammad and Edwards? Who do you think wins the fight?

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Written by:

Kevin Binoy

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Kevin Binoy is an MMA author at EssentiallySports. He earned a Bachelor's degree from Fergusson College and has been covering sports professionally for over two years. Besides working with the MMA writing team, Kevin is a core member of the organization's web stories team and is responsible for delivering engaging MMA web stories.
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