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A light heavyweight bout between Brandon Vera and Thiago Silva is in the works for UFC 125 in Las Vegas according to a report from MMAJunkie.com.
Both fighters are in desperate need of a win after a rough number of fights. Vera has lost two straight fights, to Randy Couture and Jon Jones, while Silva is 1-2 over his last three with losses to Lyoto Machida and Rashad Evans.
Vera has been out of action since the Jones fight after suffering multiple facial fractures from elbow strikes. Silva, meanwhile, hasn't fought since his loss to Evans at UFC 108 on January 2 of this year. A back injury forced him out of a planned bout with Tim Boetsch at UFC 117 last month.
UFC 125 is expected to take place on New Year's Day 2011, so it will have been nearly a year out of the cage for Silva when this event takes place.
Penick's Analysis: This is a better fight for Silva than it is for Vera at this point. Both will be coming off of lengthy injury layoffs, but Vera's been so inconsistent in his performances that it's hard to put much faith into him heading into this fight. Silva's performance against Evans was hampered by the back injury that was re-aggravated before UFC 117, and his only other loss was to Lyoto Machida right before Machida captured the UFC Light Heavyweight Championship. I think this fight is Silva's for the taking if he's recovered from the back injury well enough.
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