Jake Matthews vs. Li Jingliang set for UFC 221 in Perth

The lineup for the UFC’s first visit to Western Australia next month continues to build with the addition of a new welterweight fight.

Australia’s own Jake Matthews (11-3 MMA, 5-3 UFC) is set to take on China’s Li Jingliang (14-4 MMA, 6-2 UFC) at UFC 221. UFC officials recently announced the new booking.

UFC 221 takes place Feb. 10 at Perth Arena in Perth in Western Australia. The main card airs on pay-per-view following prelims on FS1 and UFC Fight Pass.

Matthews got back on track in November when he returned to welterweight after fighting at lightweight for the first seven bouts of his UFC tenure. That resulted in a 4-1 start in the promotion, with the lone loss coming against the highly touted James Vick.

But after a 10-1 start, including stoppages in his first four UFC victories, Matthews was stopped with a first-round TKO by Kevin Lee at the TUF 23 Finale in July 2016. It was his first fight in the United States after starting his career with 10 fights in Australia and one in nearby New Zealand.

After the Lee loss, he dropped a split decision to Andrew Holbrook at UFC Fight Night 101 in Melbourne in November 2016. After a year off, though, he returned at UFC Fight Night 121 in November with the move back up to 170 pounds and took a split call from Bojan Velickovic in Sydney. Now he’ll fight in his home country for the third straight time.

Li Jingliang

Jingliang ran his winning streak to four straight fights with a first-round TKO of Zak Ottow in November at UFC Fight Night 122 in his home country of China. The bout was his first appearance in a UFC co-main event, and he picked up his second straight $50,000 fight-night bonus.

Prior to that, he cashed an extra check for a “Fight of the Night” unanimous decision over Frank Camacho in Singapore this past June and had back-to-back knockouts of Anton Zafir and Bobby Nash. His booking at UFC 221 will be his first fight on a UFC pay-per-view since his promotional debut, a split call over David Michaud at UFC 173 in 2014.

With the addition, the latest UFC 221 card now includes:

• Champ Robert Whittaker vs. Luke Rockhold – for middleweight title
• Tyson Pedro vs. Saparbek Safarov
• Jussier Formiga vs. Ben Nguyen
• Curtis Blaydes vs. Mark Hunt
• Cyril Asker vs. Tai Tuivasa
• Damien Brown vs. “Maestro” Dong Hyun Kim
• Teruto Ishihara vs. Jose Quinonez
• Mizuto Hirota vs. Ross Pearson
• Jeremy Kennedy vs. Alex Volkanovski
• Israel Adesanya vs. Rob Wilkinson
• Li Jingliang vs. Jake Matthews

For more on UFC 221, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.