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Germaine De Randamie
Germaine De Randamie screenshot.

Earlier today, UFC announced that they were stripping women’s featherweight champion Germaine de Randamie of her title due to her unwillingness to fight her number one contender Cris Cyborg.

The promotion’s full statement on UFC.com was as follows:-

“UFC has informed Germaine de Randamie and her management team that she is being removed as the women’s featherweight champion due to her unwillingness to fight the No. 1 ranked contender, Cris ‘Cyborg’ Justino. UFC maintains that any champion is expected to accept fights against the top contenders in their respective weight classes in order to maintain the integrity of the sport.”

“The Iron Lady” has had a short but rocky title reign after only winning the inaugural women’s featherweight title against Holly Holm at UFC 208. Since then, the story has taken many twists and turns with de Randamie agreeing to a rematch with Holm, then claiming injury when talk of a fight with Cyborg came up.

After periods of silence whilst Cyborg campaigned for her title shot at UFC 214, rumours of personal issues and retirement surrounding de Randamie wouldn’t go away. Then in May, her manager, Brian Butler of SuckerPunch Entertainment, released a statement saying that the Dutch fighter was refusing to face Cyborg due to her being a “known and proven cheater.” This was in reference to the Brazilian’s shaky background after she failed a drugs test in 2011 for which she was given a one-year suspension.

Despite being regularly tested by USADA and doing her best to repair her reputation, the steroid stigma has followed Cyborg around for the rest of her career and was not helped by the fact she failed an out-of-competition drugs test in January. This conviction was quashed however after she provided documents proving her test results were caused by a legitimate medical treatment.

The straight refusal to fight her mandatory challenger would be the final straw with the UFC now moving their plans for the division along without her. The belt will now be contested by Cyborg and current Invicta FC featherweight champion Megan Anderson at UFC 214 in July.