When is UFC 304? Start times, fight card, how to watch and odds (2024)

Manchester tonight hosts UFC 304 in another huge card for a British audience.

A star-studded bill is headlined by Birmingham’s Leon Edwards, who makes the third defence of his UFC welterweight title against the no2-ranked Belal Muhammad in the main event.

Now Edwards - riding a 13-fight unbeaten streak dating back to after his first meeting with Usman in 2015 and currently ranked at No4 on the UFC’s pound-for-pound list, behind only Islam Makhachev, Alex Pereira and Jon Jones - faces a rematch with Muhammad, whom he previously faced on his long-awaited return to the octagon in March 2021, with that bout ending in a no contest after the American was left bloodied by an accidental eye poke.

Muhammad has racked up five consecutive wins since that disappointing end to his UFC main event debut, outpointing all of Demian Maia, Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson, Vicente Luque and Gilbert Burns, as well as knocking out Sean Brady.

There is plenty of other British interest on Saturday night’s card, with interim heavyweight title-holder Tom Aspinall facing Curtis Blaydes in another high-profile rematch.

Such a golden opportunity only came after an injury to Jon Jones forced the heavyweight champion to withdraw from his scheduled defence against Stipe Miocic. Jones and Miocic are expected to finally meet in November, with, according to UFC president Dana White, the winner of that fight taking on the winner of Aspinall vs Blaydes, the latter of whom lost to Pavlovich before knocking out Jailton Almeida at UFC 299 in March.

Paddy ‘The Baddy’ Pimblett is also on this weekend’s main card, taking part in his sixth UFC fight against Bobby ‘King’ Green, looking to build on his career-best win over the legendary Tony Ferguson at UFC 296 that came after his highly-contentious win over Jared Gordon.

Pimblett’s fellow Liverpool star ‘Meatball’ Molly McCann is in action against Bruna Brasil, having bounced back from consecutive defeats by Erin Blanchfield and Julija Stoliarenko to swiftly submit Diana Belbita on her strawweight debut back in February.

Christian Leroy Duncan, Arnold Allen, Nathaniel Wood, Jake Hadley, Modestas Bukauskas, Oban Elliott, Muhammad Mokaev, Sam Patterson and Mick Parkin are among the other British stars on the card hoping to impress on home soil.

UFC 304 takes place on Saturday July 27, 2024.

The event takes place at the new Co-op Live arena in Manchester, England.

Despite being held in the UK, the event will be at a similar time to cards in the US, much to the annoyance of fight fans on these shores, with the early prelim fights not due to start until 11pm BST.

The prelims will not commence until 1am BST in the early hours of Sunday morning, with the main card getting underway at 3am.

The main event is not expected to begin until approximately 4:30am.

Main card

Leon Edwards vs Belal Muhammad

Tom Aspinall vs Curtis Blaydes

Christian Leroy Duncan vs Gregory Rodrigues

Arnold Allen vs Giga Chikadze

Prelim card

Nathaniel Wood vs Daniel Pineda

Molly McCann vs Bruna Brasil

Jake Hadley vs Caolan Loughran

Modestas Bukauskas vs Marcin Prachnio

Early prelim card

Oban Elliott vs Preston Parsons

Muhammad Mokaev vs Manel Kape

Sam Patterson vs Kiefer Crosbie

Mick Parkin vs Lukasz Brzeski

Shauna Bannon vs Alice Ardelean

TV channel: In the UK, UFC 304 is being shown live on TNT Sports 1, with coverage beginning with the prelims at 1am BST on Sunday morning.

The early prelims are available with a UFC Fight Pass subscription, while in the US the prelims are on ESPN2 and ESPN+ with the main card on ESPN+.

Live stream: Those with a subscription can also catch the action live online via the Discovery+ app and website.

Leon Edwards to win: 4/9

Belal Muhammad to win: 7/4

Tom Aspinall to win: 1/4

Curtis Blaydes to win: 11/4

Paddy Pimblett to win: 1/1

Bobby Green to win: 4/5

Odds via Betfair (subject to change).