Abu Dhabi's '-ev curse': 26 wins and only 3 losses
Whenever a fighter whose surname ends in '-ev' has faced someone else in Abu Dhabi, he has almost always won. Volkanovski already suffered it once. Now comes Evloev.
By Equipo La Jaula Props · · 2 min read
Photos: Новости ННТ, CC BY 3.0 (via Wikimedia Commons, cropped)
It's a statistical curiosity, not a law of the sport, but the numbers stand out. At La Jaula Props we went through the results of the 23 UFC events held in Abu Dhabi before UFC 333 — 277 fights in total — looking for one specific pattern: what happens when a fighter whose surname ends in '-ev' faces someone whose surname doesn't.
The tally: 26-3-1
There were 30 such fights. The '-ev' fighters won 26, lost only 3, and one ended in a no contest (Magomed Ankalaev vs. Johnny Walker at UFC 294, due to an illegal knee). The three losses belong to Alexander Yakovlev (UFC 254), Gadzhi Omargadzhiev (UFC 280) and Zarrukh Adashev (in 2021).
Volkanovski has already met the curse
At UFC 294 in October 2023, Volkanovski took the lightweight title rematch against Islam Makhachev on eleven days' notice and was knocked out by a first-round head kick. It happened in the same Etihad Arena where he defends his belt against Evloev on Saturday.
The names behind the streak
- Khamzat Chimaev: 5-0 in Abu Dhabi, with wins over Kamaru Usman and Robert Whittaker.
- Islam Makhachev: 4-0, including wins over Charles Oliveira and Volkanovski.
- Magomed Ankalaev: 4 wins and a no contest.
- Movsar Evloev: 2-0 in Abu Dhabi (over Mike Grundy in 2020 and Nik Lentz in 2021).
Curse or logical explanation?
The explanation is more down to earth: many of those surnames belong to elite fighters from the Caucasus and Central Asia, who compete close to home, with little jet lag and plenty of crowd support. Abu Dhabi has long been a second home for that generation.
The UFC 333 test
On Saturday the stat is tested five times: Evloev vs. Volkanovski, Rizvan Kuniev vs. Alexander Volkov, Abdul Rakhman Yakhyaev vs. Nikita Krylov, Nurullo Aliev vs. Grant Dawson and Abubakar Vagaev vs. Jacob Malkoun. Will the streak hold? Cast your vote and we'll find out on Saturday.
Method: we counted fights in which only one of the two fighters has a surname ending in '-ev', based on each event's results table on Wikipedia. Fights between two '-ev' fighters (there was one) are excluded.
