The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) heads to Ottawa, Ontario, Canada for the first time in promotional history with UFC Fight Night 89: MacDonald vs Thompson. The 13-fight card kicks off with the UFC Fight Pass prelims at 6:45pm ET, with televised prelims to follow on FOX Sports 1 at 8:30pm ET and the main card getting going at 10:30pm ET. If interested on wagering on this fight card, betting lines will become available shortly at Several Bookmakerss. Getting the action started for the UFC Fight Night 89 prelims on FOX Sports 1 will be a barn-burner in the UFC’s bantamweight division between a pair of exciting bantamweights who, win or lose, leave it all in the Octagon every time they step foot in the cage. Both fighters are on losing skids and in desperate need to pick up a win, as another loss will likely earn them a pink slip from the promotion. Beal has dropped back to back decisions to Neil Seery and the recently-released Chris Kelades and he hopes to save his job with a victory in Ottawa. After going 2-0 in the UFC’s bantamweight division, he dropped down to flyweight, where he suffered the aforementioned defeats. Now following his first two career losses, Beal returns to 135-pounds where he remains undefeated. Soto was scheduled to make his UFC debut against Anthony Birchak at UFC 177 but when Renan Barao was removed from his title bout against TJ Dillashaw last minute, Soto was pulled from his preliminary card and put into the title fight against Dillashaw. He suffered a fifth round knockout against Dillashaw, but showed great heart being able to hang in there with the champ for that long. The former Bellator featherweight champion got the Birchak bout his next time out and lost that bout via first round knockout. In his next outing inside the Octagon, he faced Michiniro Tanaka and lost by razor-thin decision, which many felt should have gone his way. Now on a three-fight skid, he knows it is “do-or-die” time and aims to put up the fight of his life to earn his first UFC win and ultimately save his job. The next bout on the televised prelims comes in the UFC’s middleweight division and sees UFC/Bellator veteran Tamdan McCrory take on Poland’s Krzysztof Jotko. This is an excellent match-up at 185-pounds that many fight fans look forward to, as both fighters are fun to watch and this is a stylistic pairing in which anything can happen. Looking to string another one onto their winning streaks, both fighters will look to put on a show next weekend in Canada. Light-Heavyweights take center stage in the next bout scheduled for the evenings prelims on FOX Sports 1 as Misha Cirkunov hopes to go 3-0 in the UFC with a win over promotional newcomer Ion Cutelaba. The UFC newcomer from Moldova hopes to score a huge upset and ultimately the biggest victory of his promotional mixed martial arts career over the stiffest test of said career in Cirkunov. The featured bout of the UFC Fight Night 89 prelims on FOX Sports 1 is a lightweight contest between Canada’s own Jason Saggo and the Brazilian Leandro Silva. Saggo hopes to make it two in a row for himself inside the Octagon, while Silva looks to remain undefeated in his last five. The 30-year-old Saggo earned a first round TKO over Josh Shockley in his promotional debut and then dropped a split decision to Paul Felder his next time out. Following the contest, he suffered an achilles injury in training, which sidelined him for over a year. The Canadian returned to action following a 17-month layoff just over three months ago at UFC 196, where he earned a first round TKO over Justin Salas. He now aims to earn another impressive victory over Silva, who has been red-hot since losing a unanimous decision to Francisco Trinaldo in his UFC debut nearly two years ago. The loss to Trinaldo snapped a five-fight winning streak for the Brazilian, but he bounced back to the win column in impressive fashion with a first round rear naked choke victory over veteran Charlie Brennaman. He took on Drew Dober his next time out and won the bout via controversial guillotine choke submission, but the win was ultimately turned into a No Contest when Dober disputed it to the comission. The 30-year-old earned a pair of unanimous decision victories over promotional newcomer Lewis Gonzalez and TUF 8 winner Efrain Escudero in his next two Octagon outings, and he hopes to stay red-hot when he travels to enemy territory to take on the Canadian.
