Merab Promises a Surprise for Yan in Their UFC 333 Trilogy — and Yan's Defense Is the Reason He Needs One

Two fights of tape on each other, one belt on the line, and a challenger promising something nobody has scouted

ABU DHABI

Trilogies are supposed to settle things, and on October 24 in Abu Dhabi, Petr Yan and Merab Dvalishvili get their third meeting with the bantamweight title on the line as the co-main event of UFC 333. Bloody Elbow’s listing of the card places the trilogy fight directly beneath the featherweight title main event, giving Abu Dhabi a championship doubleheader to close the month. And this week the challenger added a fresh wrinkle: according to RingSide24, in reporting published on October 15, former champion Dvalishvili told UFC on Paramount that he has skills he has not shown yet and plans a surprise for Yan when they meet again.

That is a fascinating claim from a fighter the whole sport thinks it has figured out. Dvalishvili’s fighter page is a monument to relentless wrestling, chain takedowns and a gas tank that has broken elite opponents for years. Fighters do not usually hide dimensions of their game this deep into a championship career, least of all across two previous fights with the same opponent. If Merab genuinely has something new — a striking wrinkle, a submission threat, a different rhythm entirely — a trilogy fight, where both camps have two full fights of tape on each other, is the hardest place to spring it and the most rewarding place to try.

Yan’s defense is the puzzle

Dvalishvili himself acknowledged the size of the task in the same comments reported by RingSide24, praising Yan’s takedown defense, his boxing, his kickboxing and his cardio. That respect is earned. Yan’s fighter page reflects one of the most complete skill sets at 135 pounds: crisp, punishing boxing, thudding kicks, and defensive wrestling that has historically made opponents pay for every failed shot. A trilogy against that kind of defense is not won by doing the same thing louder. It is won by the adjustment nobody charted, which is precisely what Dvalishvili is promising to bring to Abu Dhabi.

The stakes cut in opposite directions for the two men, and that asymmetry is what gives this co-main event its edge. For Yan, a win in the trilogy is the signature victory his title story needs — beating the same elite rival in a deciding third fight, on a major card, with the belt on the line, is the kind of result that separates a champion from a placeholder in a deep division. Bantamweight has no shortage of contenders waiting, and a champion who has settled his defining rivalry looks very different from one who has merely survived it.

Merab’s path back to the top

For Dvalishvili, the math is about position as much as pride. A win in the trilogy strengthens his hold on the very top of the division and restores the aura that made him such a difficult champion to deal with: the sense that his pace is a problem with no clean answer. Former champions who reclaim a belt in a trilogy tend to be remembered as the rivalry’s winner, full stop, whatever happened in the middle chapters. Lose, and the road back runs through a queue of hungry contenders with no guarantee of a fourth meeting. At this level, trilogy fights are legacy referendums, and both men know it.

Stylistically, the third fight promises the same beautiful tension as the rivalry itself, now with one announced unknown layered on top. Yan will want space, clean counters and takedown defense that turns Merab’s entries into scoring opportunities of his own. Dvalishvili will want pressure, volume and the clinch, the familiar recipe — unless the promised surprise changes the recipe itself. Coaches build entire camps around tendencies built over two fights. A genuinely new look, even used sparingly, can crack a game plan that was built to be airtight against the old one.

UFC 333 was already anchored by a featherweight title fight between Alexander Volkanovski and the undefeated Movsar Evloev, and the bantamweight trilogy gives the Abu Dhabi card a second championship story with real history behind it. Two fights, two belts, and in the co-main event, a rivalry that gets its deciding chapter. When the cage door closes on October 24, the surprise Dvalishvili promised will either be the story of the night or a footnote to Yan’s signature win. There is not much room in between, and that is exactly what a trilogy is for.

There is a broader point about bantamweight worth making here, because this division rarely gets to headline its own mythology. For years the 135-pound class has been one of the deepest in the sport, stacked with former champions and elite contenders, yet its defining rivalries have often played out in the shadow of bigger weight classes on the same cards. Yan and Dvalishvili have built something different: a rivalry with genuine stylistic contrast, real history across two championship-level fights, and now a third meeting that both camps have had months to prepare for specifically. When a trilogy is earned rather than manufactured, fans can feel the difference, and everything about this one — the belt, the Abu Dhabi stage, the co-main slot beneath a featherweight title fight — says the promotion knows exactly what it has.