Nursulton Ruziboev returned after well over a year away and finished Andrey Pulyaev with a first-round submission at UFC Baku on Saturday, June 27. Abdulrakhman Yakhyaev did not factor into the bout, but the prelim card was moving fast from the opening slate at National Gymnastics Arena.
The win pushed Ruziboev to 5-0 at middleweight in the UFC, with four of those victories ending by finish. He fought for the first time since knee surgery, then took control once a caught kick put Pulyaev on the canvas and opened the path to the choke.
Ruziboev’s return lands fast
The finish came in the first round and ended the comeback before the fight could turn into a longer test of timing or pace. Ruziboev got the entry he needed, dumped Pulyaev, moved to the back, and sealed the choke without giving the exchange back.
That sequence mattered because it answered the biggest question around his return: whether a fighter coming off a long layoff could still produce the same kind of result in a live setting. He did not just survive the first minutes; he ended them.
UFC Baku kept moving
UFC Baku started its prelims at 9am ET and 6am PT, with the main card set for 12pm ET. The live page was being updated throughout the event, so the Ruziboev result sat inside a card that was still unfolding.
Other prelim results added pace to the morning. Kaan Ofli submitted Javier Reyes with a first-round arm-triangle choke for his third straight win, while Daniil Donchenko stopped Theodor Berggren in the second round to run his streak to eight.
Matsumoto and Almakhan
Jean Matsumoto and Bekzat Almakhan met in a bantamweight bout later on the UFC Baku prelims. Bekzat Almakhan had already shown the sharper early offense in that fight, dropping Matsumoto with a one-two off a naked low kick in the opening round.
That left one fight line still open in the live flow of the card: the final result of Jean Matsumoto versus Bekzat Almakhan had not been shown in the excerpt. For now, the clearest takeaway from UFC Baku is Ruziboev’s return, his 5-0 middleweight mark, and another finish added to a short list that now includes four in the UFC.
