Following hot on the heels of a pair of huge title fight announcements for the UFC’s first pay-per-view event of 2025, it has been revealed that lightweight contenders Beneil Dariush (22-6-1) and Renato Moicano (20-5-1) will also square off at UFC 311.
The event is scheduled to take place at the newly-built Intuit Dome in Inglewood, California on January 18th and will be headlined by a lightweight title fight between reigning champion Islam Makhachev and Armen Tsarukyan. The co-main event was also announced this week which will see Umar Nurmagomedov challenge newly-crowned bantamweight champion Merab Dvalishvili.
Beneil Dariush returns to competitive action after a year on the sidelines. The 35-year-old fought twice in 2023, losing to both Charles Oliveira and Armen Tsarukyan having rattled off eight consecutive victories prior to that. While he will be looking to arrest that slide in form, his opponent looks to be in fine form. “Money Moicano” extended his winning streak to four in September when he dominated Benoit Saint-Denis in front of the Parisian crowd to break into the top ten in the UFC’s 155lb rankings.
Full UFC 311 Fight Card
Islam Makhachev (26-1) vs. Armen Tsarukyan (22-3) Lightweight championship
Merab Dvalishvili (18-4) vs. Umar Nurmagomedov (18-0) Bantamweight championship
Beneil Dariush (22-6-1) vs. Renato Moicano (20-5-1) Lightweight
Jailton Almeida (21-3) vs. Serghei Spivac (17-4) Heavyweight
Jiri Prochazka (30-5-1) vs. Jamahal Hill (12-2) Light heavyweight
Kevin Holland (26-12) vs. Reinier De Ridder (18-2) Middleweight
Rinya Nakamura (9-0) vs. Muin Gafarov (19-6) Bantamweight
Johnny Walker (21-9) vs. Bogdan Guskov (16-3) Light heavyweight
Karol Rosa (18-6) vs. Ailin Perez (11-2) Bantamweight
Zach Reese (8-1) vs. Sedriques Dumas (10-2) Middleweight
Payton Talbott (9-0) vs. Raoni Barcelos (18-5) Bantamweight
Ricky Turcios (12-4) vs. Bernardo Sopaj (11-3)
Grant Dawson (22-2-1) vs. Diego Ferreira (19-5) Lightweight
In a recent episode of the Couch Warrior Podcast, host Mike welcomed Charalampos Grigoriou, who recently won a contract during season 7 of Dana White's Contender Series after knocking out Cameron Smotherman one minute into the fight. The conversation delved into Grigoriou's martial arts journey, his feelings on representing Cyprus and Greece, and future plans.
