Ilia Topuria ticked another item off his bucket list at UFC 317, but he may struggle to secure one of his remaining targets.
Topuria continued his rapid charge toward greatness on MMA’s biggest stage this past Saturday, when he added a second championship to his collection.
After a brief but violent stint on the featherweight throne, Topuria knocked out Charles Oliveira at UFC 317 to capture the lightweight title, which was vacated by Islam Makhachev.
With brutal KO after brutal KO, ‘El Matador’ is accomplishing his lofty goals in the UFC with relative ease. But one is proving a little bit more difficult to bring to fruition.
Dana White says Ilia Topuria’s UFC Spain dream ‘isn’t even an option right now’
Ever since breaking through as a rising star in the UFC, Topuria has outlined his intention to bring the Octagon to Spain.
Specifically, Topuria wants to fight for UFC in Madrid at the Santiago Bernabeu stadium. The venue’s retractable roof has made it a candidate to be the UFC’s first stadium show since UFC 243 in Australia six years ago.
But the newly crowned lightweight kingpin’s hopes to defend a title on home soil took another blow during Dana White’s press conference after UFC 317.
“Spain isn’t even an option right now,” White said.
While that will dent Topuria’s immediate hopes to compete in Spain, the UFC CEO did leave the door open to it by claiming that an eventual maiden trip to the European nation is inevitable.
“It is the goal,” White said. “We’ve been trying to get into Spain for a while here. But hopefully — that’s what I want to do and we’ll see if we can get it done…we’ll see what’s available and let’s see what we can figure out.
“We’re definitely going to Spain, it’s just a matter of when.”
The hurdle blocking the UFC’s debut in Spain
Earlier this year, Topuria revealed an issue preventing UFC Spain, suggesting the need to host a potential pay-per-view there in US primetime would be unfeasible.
More recently, the hurdle preventing the Bernabeu from hosting events outside of soccer has been detailed by journalist Rodrigo Del Campo González.
“Bernabeu can’t host anything but football at the time, they’re having really bad permit issues with the city and the neighborhood,” the journalist wrote on X.
“They remodeled in part to do concerts, they were able to host some but paid over 2.5 million Euros in fines for noise violations.”
He echoed Topuria’s past remarks in a follow-up post, noting that there is no issue with the NFL hosting a match at the venue later this year in the afternoon local time.