Merab Dvalishvili Wants His Belt Back — and Petr Yan Is in the Way

A year ago, Merab Dvalishvili was the busiest champion in the UFC. He defended the bantamweight belt three times in ten months — out-hustling Umar Nurmagomedov at UFC 311 in January, submitting Sean O'Malley at UFC 316 in June, then beating Cory Sandhagen at UFC 320 in October. That run tied the divisional record set by his teammate Aljamain Sterling, and he did it while riding a 14-fight winning streak.

Then December happened. Petr Yan ended all of it at UFC 323, closing the book on Dvalishvili's reign with a unanimous decision. Now the 35-year-old is back at #1 in the rankings and gets the man who dethroned him on Saturday at Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi. The belt's on the line again, and the trilogy is dead even at 1-1.

A Year Spent Spinning

Nicknamed "The Machine" for a reason, Dvalishvili doesn't do downtime well. He said the hardest part of 2026 wasn't the training — it was the waiting, not knowing when the fight would land. Once the news came, he relaxed. In the meantime he kept himself busy with three freestyle wrestling appearances for Real American Freestyle, competing in front of thousands in his native Georgia. Different pressure, he said, but pressure all the same.

His record now reads 21-5, with just three KOs and two submissions — proof that his game has always been about volume, grappling and relentless pace rather than one-shot power. He insists his body is fine and that he's a fighter first: if something bothers him, he shows up and competes anyway.

What the Numbers Say

The two meetings tell opposite stories. In March 2023, Dvalishvili set a UFC record by attempting 49 takedowns in a single fight, landing 11 and smothering Yan to a 50-45 sweep across all three cards. Last December, Yan flipped the script entirely — Dvalishvili managed just two takedowns on 29 attempts, while Yan landed five of his own nine and outboxed him for a clean unanimous decision.

So the pattern is clear: when the wrestling flows, Merab wins. When it stalls, Yan takes over on the feet. Dvalishvili says he's the better man and needs to prove it, and he's framing the rematch result as a one-off he's eager to correct. The rubber match should answer whether 2023 or 2025 was the aberration — and who walks out of Abu Dhabi with the strap.