Jacare Souza vs. Kelvin Gastelum Set For UFC 224

Tonight (Feb. 22, 2018), the UFC confirmed that a pivotal middleweight fight between No. 2-ranked Ronaldo “Jacare” Souza and No. 5-ranked Kelvin Gastelum will be taking place at UFC 222, which is set for May 12, 2018 from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

After suffering a brutal stoppage loss to divisional champion Robert Whittaker last April, “Jacare” bounced back last month with an impressive TKO victory over Derek Brunson in the main event of UFC on FOX 27.

Gastelum, on the other hand, suffered a submission loss to Chris Weidman last July before viciously knocking out former champion Michael Bisping late last year in Shanghai, China.

UFC 224 currently does not have a main event. Originally, there were rumors indicating that the UFC was targeting a super fight between Brazilian champions Cris Cyborg and Amanda Nunes to headline the card, but Cyborg was recently booked to take on Yana Kunitskaya at UFC 222. There’s a possibility that Nunes could still headline the card, perhaps to defend her title against Raquel Pennington.