{"id":37395,"date":"2026-03-25T16:26:06","date_gmt":"2026-03-25T16:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sherdog.com\/news\/news\/PFL-Belfast-gets-new-main-event-after-Paul-Hughes-injury-200596"},"modified":"2026-03-25T16:26:06","modified_gmt":"2026-03-25T16:26:06","slug":"pfl-belfast-gets-new-main-event-after-paul-hughes-injury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/pfl-belfast-gets-new-main-event-after-paul-hughes-injury\/","title":{"rendered":"PFL Belfast gets new main event after Paul Hughes injury"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>\n

The
\nPFL Belfast<\/a> card has taken a significant hit.<\/p>\n

Paul
\nHughes<\/a> announced on Wednesday that a knee injury has forced him
\nto withdraw from his main event bout against Jay-Jay
\nWilson<\/a>. As a result, Darragh
\nKelly<\/a> will step in and face Wilson in the new PFL Belfast
\nheadliner, the promotion confirmed. Additionally, Pedro
\nCarvalho<\/a> will step in to face Kelly\u2019s original opponent,
\nSergio
\nCossio<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

PFL Belfast takes place on April 16 at the SSE Arena in Belfast,
\nNorthern Ireland. Recent signee Rhys McKee<\/a>
\nis expected to compete in the co-main event against an opponent
\nthat will be announced next week.

<\/p>\n
\n

\ud835\ude4b\ud835\ude41\ud835\ude47 \ud835\ude3d\ud835\ude40\ud835\ude47\ud835\ude41\ud835\ude3c\ud835\ude4e\ud835\ude4f \ud835\ude50\ud835\ude4b\ud835\ude3f\ud835\ude3c\ud835\ude4f\ud835\ude40 \ud83d\udea8<\/p>\n

Paul
\nHughes<\/a> is OUT of PFL Belfast due to injury. We wish Paul well
\nin his recovery.<\/p>\n

Undefeated lightweight Darragh
\nKelly<\/a>\u2078 steps in to face New Zealand\u2019s Jay Jay<\/a> Wilson\u2076
\nin the lightweight main event.<\/p>\n

Rhys
\nMcKee<\/a>\u2019s opponent will be\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/SMNG3nyNpT<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 PFL Europe (@PFLEurope)
\nMarch 25, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/center><\/p>\n

Surgery on the Horizon<\/h2>\n

Hughes provided a statement on his exit in an Instagram video.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout going into too much detail, I picked up a knee injury in
\npreparations and having explored every option it just isn\u2019t
\npossible for me to carry on training,\u201d Hughes said. \u201cI\u2019ve consulted
\nwith my team alongside top professionals and unfortunately this
\ninjury cannot be pushed through anymore. I will be having surgery
\nvery soon to fix this issue. This is the game of mixed martial
\narts. It\u2019s the highest highs and the lowest lows and this is one of
\nthe lowest lows. I am absolutely crushed. I think everyone knows
\nhow much this means to me to bring PFL back to Belfast. To not only
\nshowcase my skills, but to also highlight the talent that we have
\non this island in front of the world. From the bottom of my heart,
\nI want to apologize to all of my supporters and everyone that I\u2019ve
\nlet down, especially those that have spent their hard-earned money
\non tickets on flights to come and see me fight at home. That will
\nnever, ever sit well with me, and I will never be OK with it, and
\nit will always eat at me that I cannot deliver.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the unfortunate reality of the sport. I\u2019m due now to have
\nsurgery very soon and that begins my next chapter, the road to
\nrecovery. I want to be back in the cage as soon as humanly possible
\nto right this wrong. It has been a wild journey since joining the
\nPFL and it\u2019s going to be very hard to sit out now for some months
\nwith everything I\u2019m working so hard to achieve, but this is now a
\npart of the story. Every obstacle that\u2019s ever been thrown my way
\nhas always propelled me to new heights. I\u2019m going to get through
\nthis and I\u2019m going to come back better than ever. This goal has not
\nchanged. I\u2019m still going to the top of this entire sport and I\u2019ll
\nsee you there.\u201d<\/p>\n

A
\nhigh stakes middleweight clash headlines PFL Pittsburgh: Tune in
\nLIVE, Saturday, March 28 at 10 p.m. ET<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A former Cage Warriors champion, Hughes was a high-profile free
\nagent signing for the
\nPFL<\/a> in 2024. He has gone 2-2 in the organization, with both of
\nhis losses coming to lightweight champion Usman
\nNurmagomedov<\/a>. The Irish standout also owns victories over
\nA.J.
\nMcKee<\/a> and Bruno Mirando in PFL competition.<\/p>\n

Kelly, 27, owns a 9-0 professional record \u2014 with the majority of
\nhis victories coming in either the PFL or Bellator
\nMMA<\/a>. In his most recent outing, \u201cMoville Mauler\u201d submitted
\nBakhtiyar
\nAbdulloev<\/a> in the opening stanza at a PFL Europe event in
\nSeptember 2025.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
<\/blockquote>\n

<\/center> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The PFL Belfast card has taken a significant hit. Paul Hughes announced on Wednesday that a knee injury has forced him to withdraw from his main event bout against Jay-Jay Wilson. As a result, Darragh Kelly will step in and face Wilson in the new PFL Belfast headliner, the promotion confirmed. Additionally, Pedro Carvalho will […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37396,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[150],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37395","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-martial-arts-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37395\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}