Anthony Pettis is going back to boxing, and he’s doing it on the other side of the world. The former UFC lightweight champion will face Neeraj Goyat in a six-round super welterweight bout at 154 pounds on Saturday, January 23, 2027, in India. Promotional officials confirmed the fight to MMA Fighting, and Most Valuable Promotions announced it on X. The event is presented by IPBL Boxing and sanctioned by the Indian Boxing Council, with Jake Paul and Nakisa Bidarian of MVP co-promoting. Hyderabad, Visakhapatnam and Chennai are all in the running to host, and the city and venue are expected to be named in November.
The fight has a family thread running through it. Sergio Pettis, Anthony’s younger brother and a former Bellator champion, boxed in India in March 2025 and lost a unanimous decision to Sabari Jaishankar. Anthony has clearly been carrying that one around.
“I have seen what Indian fighters can do, and Neeraj is the best of them,” Pettis said. “That is who I want. I have thought a lot about Sergio’s loss. This one is for him, and I am coming to win.”
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Where both men stand
Pettis is 39 and turns 40 just days after the fight. He’s 1-1 as a pro boxer, with a majority decision win over Roy Jones Jr. at Gamebred Boxing 4 in April 2023 and a decision loss to Chris Avila on the undercard of Nate Diaz vs. Jorge Masvidal in July 2024. That Avila fight is still his most recent appearance in any combat sport. He’s also staying busy before January, though. Bloody Elbow reported that this is his second booking in a week, after he was announced to wrestle Donald Cerrone at RAF 15 in Chicago on November 28.
Goyat, whom ESPN called India’s top professional boxer, is 21-4-2 with nine knockouts across 27 pro fights. He’s on a five-fight win streak, which includes his win over Brazilian YouTuber Whindersson Nunes on the Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson Netflix card. MVP signed him, and Paul and Bidarian said in a joint statement that they believed he had the potential to become a global boxing star and help put Indian boxing on the world stage.
For Goyat, the location matters as much as the opponent.
“I have fought in China, in Thailand, in America and in the UK, and every time I was the Indian on somebody else’s card,” he said. “This time the card is ours.” He added that he respects everything Pettis has done, then closed with this: “I am not giving that night away.”
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MVP is billing the event as the biggest card in Indian boxing history, and its announcement also featured actor Rana Daggubati alongside the fighters and promoters.
Quick take
I like the Sergio angle because it’s real, and I like Goyat’s line about always being the guest on someone else’s show, because that’s what a career of road fights actually feels like. But the boxing math here isn’t kind to Pettis. He’s a 40-year-old with three pro rounds’ worth of momentum, coming off a loss to Avila, and he’ll spend part of his camp preparing to wrestle Cerrone in late November. Goyat has 27 fights, five straight wins and a home crowd that has never had a night like this. Pettis has always had the kind of spinning, creative timing that can steal a round from anybody, but six rounds is a long time to steal from a real boxer in his own country. Goyat should be the favorite, and the venue announcement in November will tell us how big a crowd shows up to watch him prove it.
