Anthony Pettis and Clay Collard will face each other in the PFL’s first event of the 2021 season.
The PFL announced the full lineup for their first event of the 2021 season and along with some familiar names from their previous seasons come some very noticeable new ones. The featherweight and lightweight matchups for its season kickoff PFL 1, taking place on April 23 on ESPN2 and ESPN+.
While they do run a season format, the final fight of the scheduled event will be Pettis vs. Collard. Pettis, a former UFC lightweight champion surprised a lot of fans when the announcement was made that he signed with the PFL at the end of last year. Pettis was coming off a win in his last fight at UFC Vegas 17 when he defeated Alex Morono. He exited the UFC on a two-fight win streak.
While Pettis was ending his time in the UFC in 2020, Collard was making waves in the world of boxing picking up five wins before losing a unanimous decision at the end of the year. It looks like he missed MMA and will be testing his punching power against a former UFC champ in Pettis when the PFL begins their season.
Other notable fighters on the card are 2018, 2019 featherweight champion Lance Palmer who looks to begin his run at year three with the promotion as well as 2018, 2019 lightweight champion, Natan Schulte. The featherweight and lightweight possibilities are going to make for an interesting season and the competition is certainly deep this year in the PFL. Check out the full fight card:
ESPN 2 Card
Anthony Pettis vs. Clay Collard
Natan Schulte vs. Marcin Held
Movlid Khaybulaev vs. Jason Soares
Lance Palmer vs. Bubba Jenkins
ESPN+ Card
Loik Radzhabov vs. Johnny Case
Joilton Lutterbach vs. Olivier Aubin-Mercier
Akhmed Aliev vs. Mikhail Odintsov
Jo Sungbin vs. Tyler Diamond
Brendan Loughnane vs. Sheymon Moraes
