The UFC confirmed during the UFC Vegas 124 broadcast that Israel Adesanya (24-6) will headline UFC Saudi Arabia on December 5 at ANB Arena in Riyadh against Shara Magomedov (17-1). Both fights at the top are five rounds. Ian Machado Garry (17-2) meets Yaroslav Amosov (30-1) in the co-main. FightOdds.io opened Adesanya at -205 and Magomedov at +173, with Garry at -185 over Amosov at +157.
The headliner has a simple premise. Adesanya is 37 and hasn’t won since he knocked out Alex Pereira in Round 2 of their UFC 287 rematch in April 2023. Since then he dropped the belt to Sean Strickland, got submitted by Dricus Du Plessis in Round 4, then was stopped by Nassourdine Imavov and, in March at UFC Seattle, by Joe Pyfer. That’s four losses in a row and three straight stoppages. Heavy’s odds writeup floated that a fifth straight loss could push him toward retirement.
What changed for Adesanya
The biggest variable is the corner. This is his first fight since he split with Eugene Bareman and City Kickboxing in July. Cageside Press reports he’s moved to Freestyle MMA in Sydney, the gym Alexander Volkanovski also calls home. Athlon ran a headline quoting him as “Best I’ve Felt in a Long Time” about the new camp. Every fighter says that after a gym change, so I’m not giving it much weight yet. Still, a new room is the one real lever a fighter on a four-fight skid can pull, and I respect him for pulling it rather than running back the same camp.
My read on the decline, from the results alone: the Du Plessis, Imavov and Pyfer fights all ended before the scorecards, which means opponents were getting to him and staying there. Adesanya’s whole system at his best was distance management. When that slips even a little at 37, the bill comes due in stoppages.
The Magomedov problem
Magomedov is the kind of opponent who punishes a fighter who can’t hold range anymore. He went 18-2 in Muay Thai, won the Russian championship, and finished all five of his sanctioned Lethwei opponents. The double spinning backfist that flattened Armen Petrosyan at the end of Round 2 at UFC 308 is the clip everyone knows, and it tells you how he thinks. He throws from strange angles and keeps throwing after a miss.
He’s also legally blind in one eye after a training injury in Thailand, according to his Wikipedia biography. My read is that Adesanya’s new coaches will spend real camp time on which side to circle toward and where to set feints. Fighting a half-blind opponent is an old striking problem, and Adesanya has always been a technician who loves solving those.
The tape on Magomedov’s ceiling is Michael Page. In February 2025, in Saudi Arabia, Page out-moved him and won a clear unanimous decision for Magomedov’s only pro loss. Page beat him with exactly the tools Adesanya built a title reign on: lateral movement, long range and a refusal to stand in front of him. Since then Magomedov has gone to decisions twice, a Fight of the Night with Marc-André Barriault and a win over Michel Pereira at UFC Baku in June. After the Pereira fight he called Adesanya out.
His grappling side is worth knowing too, because it gets ignored. He drew a submission grappling match with Arman Tsarukyan in December 2025 and beat Neiman Gracie 11-3 in a freestyle wrestling match in September. I don’t expect him to wrestle Adesanya, but a striker with that background is hard to clinch-tie or shove off the fence.
The kicker is the format. Heavy noted Adesanya has far more five-round main event experience, and that’s where I think the betting line comes from. The question for me is whether Adesanya’s legs are still there in Rounds 4 and 5 to make Magomedov miss the way Page did for three.
My pick: Magomedov by stoppage in the second half of the fight. The price tells me the market still believes in Adesanya’s skill, and I do too. Three straight stoppages tell me his chin and his footwork have stopped protecting that skill. I’d be happy to be wrong.
Garry and the quote that came back around
The co-main comes with homework already assigned. Bloody Elbow resurfaced footage from November 2025, after Garry outpointed Belal Muhammad at UFC Qatar, when he was asked about Amosov signing with the UFC. “Him versus me, gets smashed,” Garry said, adding that he didn’t know who Amosov was and that he felt “sorry for him.” Turkish reporter Kerem Akbilek, who asked the original question, wrote on X that he hopes the UFC uses it in the promo.
Amosov has since submitted Neil Magny with an anaconda choke in Round 1 and Joel Álvarez with an arm-triangle in Round 2. Two fights in, he’s 2-0 with two chokes. His Bellator run went 8-1, including the title over Douglas Lima, and his only pro loss was the Jason Jackson knockout in November 2023, which came after he’d spent a year and a half away from the cage defending Ukraine.
Garry is ranked first in the media rankings, he’s 28, and he’s lost only to Shavkat Rakhmonov and, this summer at UFC 330, to Islam Makhachev. Both went five full rounds. That’s the strongest thing on his résumé for this matchup. He’s spent 10 championship rounds with two of the most suffocating grapplers in the sport and stayed upright enough to hear the decision both times. He also trained at Chute Boxe Diego Lima alongside Charles Oliveira, so he isn’t walking in naive about the mat.
My read: the fight lives in the transitions. If Garry keeps Amosov at the end of his kicks and jab, he wins rounds cleanly. Amosov’s two UFC finishes both came off scrambles where he got to the neck, and the guys who beat Garry did it by making him carry weight for 25 minutes. The catch for Garry is the turnaround. Cageside Press noted he’s back just four months after Makhachev.
My pick: Amosov by decision. Garry will win the first round on volume, and I think Amosov’s chain wrestling wins the next three.
Where it leaves the divisions
At welterweight, Michael Morales and Carlos Prates fight for an interim belt at UFC 336 on January 30 in Toronto, and Rakhmonov posted “Soon 2027” on Instagram. A Garry win keeps him first in line behind that. An Amosov win puts a 31-1 Ukrainian into a title picture that’s already crowded. At middleweight, Magomedov sits 15th in the media rankings and Adesanya ninth, so the winner jumps. The loser’s situation is far worse if it’s Adesanya. Fight night is December 5, one week before UFC 335.
