Racic vs. Branchuk Added to M-1 Challenge 64 Card

M-1 Global announced on Thursday afternoon an addition to its M-1 Challenge 64 card: a bantamweight title eliminator between Antun Racic and Vitali Branchuk.

The victor will earn the right to fight for the vacant M-1 Challenge 135-pound title against the winner of the previously-announced clash between Pavel Vitruk and Sergey Morozov, also on M-1 Challenge 64. The two victorious combatants will lock horns at an M-1 Challenge card later in the year.

M-1 Challenge 64 goes down Feb. 19 at Olympic Stadium in Moscow. The marquee is headlined by three-time Bellator champion Alexander Shlemenko taking on former M-1 Challenge middleweight and light heavyweight titlist Vyacheslav Vasilevsky in the semifinals of the M-1 Global Grand Prix Middleweight Tournament. The co-featured bout pits Alexander Volkov against Denis Smolderaev for the vacant M-1 Challenge heavyweight crown.

Racic, who hails from Croatia, has won five of his last six and is coming off a unanimous decision win over Alexey Nevzorov at M-1 Challenge 61. Branchuk has won seven straight, though he hasn’t fought for M-1 since losing to Yunus Evloev at M-1 Challenge 45 two years ago.

The event will be streamed live in HD on M1Global.tv.