UFC London opener between Nasrat Haqparast and Nad Narimani cancelled

The opening bout of UFC Fight Night: Werdum vs. Volkov was supposed to feature a lightweight bout between Nasrat Haqparast and Nad Narimani, but less than an hour before it was scheduled to occur, the fight has been called off.

Nolan King (@mma_kings) first reported the fight cancellation. The news was shortly confirmed after by UFC officials.

It was understood that the UFC medical staff would not clear Haqparast to fight due to a infectious eye condition.

The card, which will now proceed with ten fights, will instead begin with a heavyweight contest between Mark Godbeer and UFC newcomer Dmitry Sosnovskiy. The cancellation of Haqparast vs Narimani means that the UFC London broadcast will instead begin at 2PM ET/11AM PT.

Haqparast has since released a statement regarding his withdrawal on his Instagram account.

“News regarding my fight at UFC London,” Haqparast said. “We’re sitting in the locker room and it’s just 1 hour left to the fight but unfortunately the UFC doctors stopped my fight. I got an eye infection on fight week, got 3 different medications and from day to day it became worst. I had sunglasses on on the official weigh ins to not show my infected eye and still try to fight. We tried everything possible to deliver the best performance of my life.”