UFC 321 — tom aspinall vs. ciryl gane: five biggest storylines to follow on fight card

For the first time since Jon Jones’ March 2023 win over Cyril Gane, the UFC’s undisputed heavyweight championship will be defended without an active interim title in play. 

Tom Aspinall, the former interim titleholder who has now been upgraded to full champion, will make his first defense when he welcomes Gane on Saturday in the main event of UFC 321 in Abu Dhabi. 

The reason for the division’s issues in recent years has been Jones’ combination of inactivity and an unwillingness to defend his title against Aspinall. But, in June, Jones vacated the title and briefly retired before announcing just days later that he plans on returning later this year. 

As we prepare for the promotion’s 22nd trip to the capital city of the United Arab Emirates, let’s take a closer look at the biggest storylines entering the card. 

1. Seemingly all of the pressure is on Tom Aspinall 

As successful as Aspinall has been throughout nine walks to the Octagon, including eight stoppage wins and one loss due to a knee injury (that was avenged by KO three fights later), there are still key aspects about the 32-year-old Englishman’s game that we don’t know. He has never been past the second round in 18 pro fights, let alone ever reaching the championship distance of five rounds. How is he on the ground? What does his chin look like in a firefight? All we know, up to this point, is that Aspinall has fast hands and huge power, along with the fact that he tends to keep his chin exposed while backpedaling (yet has never been made to pay for it). And then there were the constant comments from Jones while trying to justify his ducking of Aspinall, which included questioning his ability to fight, sell tickets and whether he’s not a flash-in-the-pan in waiting. Should Aspinall, who is more than a 4-to-1 betting favorite against Gane, lose in any form, would that somehow validate the dismissive comments of Jones? Either way, Aspinall must prove against Gane that Jones had good reason not to risk his near-perfect fighting record on such a dynamic and explosive talent who very much appears to be the future of the division. 

2. With that said, it feels like now or never for Cyril Gane’s championship hopes

The 35-year-old Gane once looked like the prototype heavyweight of the future when the 6-foot-5 kickboxer arrived on the UFC scene in 2019, just one year after leaving Muay Thai behind to try MMA for the first time. Gane even went as far as stopping Derrick Lewis to claim the interim heavyweight title in 2021 while improving to 10-0 as a pro. But the ensuing four years saw Gane seemingly regress instead of improving. His ground game was badly exposed in a pair of disappointing title losses to Francis Ngannou (who fought with one working knee) and Jones (who submitted Gane just 2:04 into Round 1). In between, there were also a few rough moments during victories as Gane was visibly hurt multiple times in a 2022 knockout win over Tai Tuivasa. And then there was his most recent fight last December, in a rematch with Alexander Volkov, where Gane captured a highly disputed win via split decision, which UFC CEO Dana White openly disagreed. Gane, who briefly looked reborn in a 2023 TKO win over a streaking Serghei Spivac, knows full well that this could be his final shot at the undisputed crown after two disappointing endings in the past. It will be up to the native of France to take Aspinall into deep waters and prove he has improved upon his glaring weaknesses on the ground. 

3. Zhang Weili’s departure has left the women’s strawweight division up for grabs

Zhang, the 36-year-old Chinese star and two-time champion at 115 pounds, recently vacated her title in order to move up to challenge flyweight queen Valentina Shevchenko in a historic superfight that will serve as the co-headliner for UFC 322 in November. The good news, however, is that Zhang’s exit, at a time when strawweight lacks the star-powered depth it once knew, opens up a massive opportunity for whomever is able to seize it. Enter Virna Jandiroba and Mackenzie Dern, who will meet in a rematch of their 2020 bout, in this weekend’s co-main event for the vacant title. Jandiroba, who lost three of her first six UFC fights after debuting in 2019, has found her stride late in the Octagon as the former Invicta FC champion is riding a five-fight win streak at age 37. The native of Brazil is soft-spoken but highly technical inside the cage and her resurgence has produced wins over a handful of top contenders like Yan Xiaonan, Amanda Lemos, Loopy Godinez and Marina Rodriguez. Dern, who claimed a decision win over Jandiroba in their first meeting, has had a different road to the top and was thought to be a future star with huge marketing potential ever since her 2018 debut. Although Dern is currently riding a two-fight win streak, she’s just 3-4 in her last seven fights. At 32, Dern’s time is right now but she will need to shake off a history of poor gameplanning and inconsistent striking technique to fulfill her potential against a former foe who has consistently improved. 

4. Is Umar Nurmagomedov the only bantamweight who can beat Merab Dvalishvili?

That might seem like a silly question to pose, especially considering a then-unbeaten Nurmagomedov lost a unanimous decision while challenging Dvalishvili for the title in January. But the dominant Dvalishvili, who returns for his fourth title defense of 2025 in a December rematch against former champion Petr Yan, has very few weaknesses and Nurmagomedov still has the perfectly well-rounded game to potentially give him trouble. Nurmagomedov, the cousin of UFC Hall of Famer Khabib Nurmagomedov, also broke his right hand in Round 1 against Dvalishvili last time and believes he still did enough to win despite 48-47 (twice) and 49-46 scorecards. Not only does Nurmagomedov have the ability to threaten takedowns against Dvalishvili, the only thing he lacked against “The Machine” appeared to be a gas tank on par with the Georgian champion who never tires. Nurmagomedov has said he will adjust that gap entering his return against Mario Bautista. With Dvalishvili having effectively cleaned out the division, Saturday’s winner should get the next shot at the champion and Nurmagomedov has been installed as high as a 6-to-1 betting favorite to snap Bautista’s eight-fight win streak.   

5. Alexander Volkov’s “gift” is anything but an easy fight

Volkov, the towering Russian giant, had his resurgent five-fight win streak snapped in December when Gane took home a split-decision that almost no one agreed with. The result seemed, at first, like yet another time in which Volkov lost a big fight that could’ve catapulted him into a title shot (similar to how he was knocked out by Derrick Lewis in the closing seconds of a 2018 fight he was thoroughly winning). Luckily for Volkov, White agreed he had been done wrong against Gane by the judges and was heard on camera consoling Volkov by saying he will “take care of him” in the future. Apparently, that meant a key contender’s bout against Brazilian ground specialist Jailton Almeida, who is 8-1 in the UFC with seven wins by finish (and four via submission). Almeida enters as a slight betting favorite given the inconsistent takedown defense that the 36-year-old Volkov has often shown. But the good news is that a victory, provided he doesn’t get passed over by a returning Jones or a rising Alex Pereira, likely puts him in line for a UFC title shot that remains elusive to the former Bellator MMA champion.