UFC 251 opponents Jose Aldo and Petr Yan sparred together in Brazil

At the upcoming UFC 251 pay-per-view in Russia, Petr Yan will be facing Jose Aldo for the vacant UFC Bantamweight Championship and in the lead-up to the fight, the two men have developed quite the against each other.

During the early stages of his UFC career, Yan also trained alongside Aldo when the former traveled to Brazil for a sparring session with the former UFC Featherweight Champion at the Nova Uniao.

While speaking to MMA Fighting in a recent interview, Nova Uniao’s Eduardo Dantas opened up on Yan's sparring session with Aldo, something that he had the chance of witnessing in his own eyes.

UFC 251 opponents Jose Aldo and Petr Yan once sparred together in Brazil

Eduardo Dantas was recently in conversation with MMA Fighting and during the interview, he spoke on the upcoming Petr Yan vs Jose Aldo fight which is scheduled for UFC 251 and will be contested for the vacant UFC Bantamweight Championship.

Dantas also weighed in on Yan and Aldo sparring together from a few years ago when the latter was the kingpin of the UFC Featherweight Division.

“He trained a lot with us, especially me, because we’re both bantamweights.He trained boxing and kickboxing, I haven’t seen him do much of ground game in the gym, but this kid always showed a lot of heart. He came from a different team, a different country, didn’t speak our language, but came here and put on great training sessions. He was always there to train, always available.”- said Dantas.

Dantas also recalled hanging around with Yan in the city and when asked to pick a winner for UFC 251, 'Dudu' claimed that he firmly believes Brazil will get another champion in the form of Jose Aldo when he beats Yan for the vacant UFC Bantamweight Championship.

“Based on the training I had with Yan and Aldo — we’re obviously in a different time now, four years later — you can’t compete them technically,” Dantas said. “I’ve seen so-called specialists say that Yan’s boxing and kickboxing are better than Junior’s. I think that’s a huge mistake because if you really analyse their boxing, it’s completely different. If you stop and look at the strikers they have fought, it’s completely different. If Yan fought one guy that is tough on the feet, that’s already too much. You can’t compare. Yan might be younger, he’s coming fully motivated, he trains really hard, but you can’t compare them technique-wise. To me, Junior is way more complete. And about (them) training (together), you probably already know how it must have gone, right? Not to mention that Aldo was way heavier and way stronger. Yan weighed around 148 pounds when he came here, he was always skinny. You can’t compare.”

Yan and Aldo will square-off at UFC 251 which is scheduled for 12th July 2020 and will be headlined by Kamaru Usman and Gilbert Burns for the UFC Welterweight Championship. UFC 251 will take place at the Yas Island in Abu Dhabi, also known as the UFC Fight Island.