Bellator 297 loses two bouts including former title challenger

Bellator 297 has taken a pair of hits the week prior to the June 16 event at Wintrust Arena in Chicago.

Former Bellator middleweight title challenger Austin Vanderford (11-2 MMA, 5-2 BMMA) was expected to face Imamshafi Aliev (9-0 MMA, 1-0 BMMA), but that fight has been canceled for undisclosed reasons.

Additionally, the bantamweight bout between Leandro Higo (21-6 MMA, 4-4 BMMA) and Nikita Mikhailov (10-2 MMA, 3-1 BMMA) is off due to an illness with the former.

The card is set to proceed with 16 bouts including a light heavyweight title fight in the main event, as champion Vadim Nemkov (16-2 MMA, 8-0 BMMA) tries to defend his title against former UFC title challenger Yoel Romero (9-4 MMA, 15-6 BMMA).

In the co-main event, Bellator featherweight champion Patricio Freire (35-5 MMA, 23-5 BMMA) looks to become the first fighter to win three divisional titles in the same major promotion when he takes on Bellator bantamweight champion Sergio Pettis (22-5 MMA, 9-5 BMMA).

With the cancellations, the Bellator 297 card includes:

• Champion Vadim Nemkov vs. Yoel Romero – for light heavyweight title
• Champion Sergio Pettis vs. Patricio Freire – for bantamweight title
• Corey Anderson vs. Phil Davis
• Daniel James vs. Gokhan Saricam
• David McKinney vs. Max Metzgar
• Wladmir Gouvea vs. Gabriel Sayeg
• Kyle Crutchmer vs. Bobby Nash
• Pieter Buist vs. Gadzhi Rabadanov
• Ramazan Kurmagomedov vs. Jaleel Willis
• Mike Hamel vs. Shamil Nikaev
• Norbert Novenyi vs. Kamil Oniszczuk
• Archie Colgan vs. Emmanuel Sanchez
• Karl Moore vs. Alex Polizzi
• Timur Khizriev vs. Richie Smullen
• Jordan Newman vs. Matthew Perry
• Edwin Chavez vs. Cody Law

For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for Bellator 297.