Dan Hooker and Salahdine Parnasse headline UFC Fight Night: Hooker vs. Parnasse at the Accor Arena in Paris on September 5, but three other bouts on the card carry stories worth setting an alarm for: a striking stylist fighting out the final bout of his contract, a Paris-born knockout artist trying to erase his first finish loss in front of his own crowd, and a ranked veteran defending her spot after months on the shelf. The main card streams on Paramount+ starting at 3:00 PM ET, prelims at 12:00 PM ET.

Michael Page vs. Nursulton Ruziboev: A Contract on the Line

Michael "Venom" Page is 39 years old, riding a three-fight win streak that includes a decision over former title challenger Jared Cannonier, and fighting out the final bout of his current UFC deal. His karate-influenced range game has made him one of the most distinctive strikers on the roster, built around reflexes and distance rather than volume — the kind of style that either frustrates opponents into mistakes or gets picked apart by anyone who can close the gap.

That's exactly what Nursulton Ruziboev is built to do. The Uzbek finisher has won three straight in the Octagon, most recently a first-round submission in June, and carries a finish rate over 90 percent across his career. The betting market has Page as the favorite at -170 to Ruziboev's +140, but a fighter who submits or knocks out almost everyone he faces is never a safe out for a striker who has to let him get close enough to counter. Page vs. Ruziboev is a clean style clash with an unusually direct stake attached — a win keeps Page's leverage intact for his next deal, and a loss hands it to Ruziboev.

Oumar Sy vs. Modestas Bukauskas: A Homecoming After the First Real Setback

Oumar Sy is from Paris, and the Accor Arena is a building he had never lost in — until a first-round guillotine choke this past March ended that streak and handed him the first finish loss of his career. Before that, nine of his twelve career wins had come by knockout or submission, the profile of a fighter who finishes rather than survives. Now he's back in front of the crowd that has always been his, trying to prove the loss was a bad night and not a pattern.

Modestas Bukauskas isn't an easy fighter to make a statement against. The Lithuanian former two-time Cage Warriors champion has 11 knockouts of his own and just answered a stoppage loss of his own — to Nikita Krylov at UFC 324 — with a split-decision win in May. Both men have been finished before, both hit hard enough to finish anyone else on the roster, and the market has Sy favored at -246 to Bukauskas's +186. Sy vs. Bukauskas is the fight on this card most likely to end before the horn, in front of the one crowd that will make it matter more than most first-round finishes do.

Nora Cornolle vs. Klaudia Syguła: A Ranking Defended After Months Away

Nora Cornolle is ranked in the top 15 of the UFC's women's bantamweight division, a former French national Muay Thai champion who hasn't fought since a submission loss in February sidelined her with an injury for months. Fighting ranked and fighting rusty rarely go together well, and Paris is where she has to answer both questions at once, in front of her home fans.

Klaudia Syguła doesn't have a ranking to defend, which is exactly the point — she's won her last two fights by unanimous decision and is one result away from cracking the top 15 herself. The market sees this as close to a coin flip, Cornolle a slight favorite at -125 to Syguła's +105. Cornolle vs. Syguła is a straightforward rankings-implication fight buried on the prelims: a layoff-tested veteran against a well-rounded grinder with real momentum, and a real position in the top 15 on the table either way it goes.

Why these three over the top of the card

None of these three carries the immediate spotlight of the Hooker-Parnasse main event or the all-French rankings stakes of Ziam vs. Sola in the co-main. That's what makes them worth watching in their own right. Page-Ruziboev is a style clash with a contract attached, Sy-Bukauskas is a hometown fighter trying to answer the first real setback of his career in the one building where he's supposed to be unbeatable, and Cornolle-Syguła is a ranked fighter's first test back from injury against a rising challenger. Each is a genuinely different kind of stakes from the story running through the top of the card.

The takeaway

If your Saturday plan is to catch the walkouts for Hooker and Parnasse and call it a night, you'll miss three fights that carry real consequences of their own. Page-Ruziboev decides who keeps the leverage in a looming contract negotiation, Sy-Bukauskas is a hometown fighter's chance to answer the only finish loss of his career, and Cornolle-Syguła puts a top-15 ranking on the line in a fight most casual viewers will scroll past. All three sit on the full Paris card alongside the headliners, and each one is worth being awake for on its own.