Peter Queally’s Bellator 270 main event fight against Patricky ‘Pitbull’ Freire at the 3 Arena in Dublin has been upgraded to a title fight after Patricky’s brother, Patricio, vacated the lightweight belt.
The news was announced by Bellator CEO Scott Coker on ‘The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani’, which was live-streamed on YouTube on Wednesday.
The event takes place on Friday, November 5 with tickets currently available for the card – the full card will be aired live on Virgin Media Two.
Patricio, who is also nicknamed Pitbull, made the decision so that his brother could fight for the belt.
His recent loss to AJ McKee in Bellator’s Featherweight Grand Prix final, in which he lost the belt at 145 lbs was also a factor in his decision.
“If I lost at 145 pounds, I can’t be the champion at 155,” Patricio stated on The MMA Hour.
“The other side, I have my brother as No. 1 contender. If he keeps winning, he’s gonna fight for the belt and I’m not gonna fight my brother.”
Queally and Patricky will fight for the second time when they step into the circular cage in search of the lightweight belt.
Queally won their first fight in May at Bellator 258 via a doctor’s stoppage in the second round.
‘The Showstopper’ also beat Ryan Scope at Bellator 227 back in September 2019 and will earn the belt in the division if he wins a third fight in a row – a streak he has only put together once before but never at Bellator.
Scott Coker broke the news on ‘The MMA Hour’: “I think it’s the first time we’ve had a title fight in Ireland for Bellator so I think it’s going to be a big deal and these guys deserve it…we were just asking [Patricio] ‘what do you want to do next?’ and this conversation came into his thoughts and I said ‘ok, well then, we’ll fulfil your wishes and here we are.
“Now we have a great main event and the Gallagher-Mix [fight] will be the semi-main event so we have a great 1-2 punch in Ireland.”
