Alex Pereira dramatically knocked out at UFC White House as Ciryl Gane becomes interim heavyweight champion

Alex Pereira suffered a disastrous knockout defeat to Ciryl Gane in the UFC White House co-main event.

Pereira, contesting his first-ever heavyweight bout, was put on red alert when the Frenchman dropped him with a fierce right jab in the second round.

Getty

Getty

Getty

Gane followed up with a series of hammerfists and brutal blows, and referee Herb Dean could’ve realistically stopped the contest at any point.

Gane the champ

Another huge right hand from Gane and several further punches left Pereira unable to respond, meaning Dean, who had given the Brazilian plenty of chances to recover, had no choice but to stop the fight.

‘Bon Gamin’ has now set up a unification heavyweight rematch with champion Tom Aspinall, who fought Gane to a no-contest last October at UFC 321 following a nasty double eye poke.

Aspinall, who was notably absent on the South Lawn of the White House, had already confirmed in the build-up that he would fight the winner of Pereira vs Gane.

“We will see,” Gane said when asked by Joe Rogan about the Aspinall rematch.

“Now I just want to say thank you. Thank you to Dana [White]. Thank you to UFC. Thank you [Pereira and his team].”

The UFC Freedom 250 card had witnessed five consecutive knockouts before Pereira met Gane for the interim heavyweight title.

Diego Lopes kicked off proceedings with a nasty finish of American Steve Garcia before Bo Nickal delivered with an emphatic performance against Kyle Daukaus.

Mauricio Ruffy then proposed to his longtime partner after obliterating Michael Chandler, and Josh Hokit made light work of Derrick Lewis in a top-ranked heavyweight clash.

It was up to Sean O’Malley to deliver next, and ‘Suga’ did exactly that, flattening Canadian Aiemann Zahabi in the second round of their bantamweight bout and calling for a shot to reclaim his title next.

BREAKING NEWS… more to follow.