Duty Free Tennis Stadium

The Duty Free Tennis Stadium in Dubai, more commonly referred to in boxing and tennis coverage as the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium or simply the Dubai Tennis Stadium, is the centre court of the Aviation Club Tennis Centre complex in Garhoud, Dubai. Built in 1995 and officially opened in 1996, it is owned and operated by Dubai Duty Free and forms part of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Centre. The stadium seats around 5,000 for tennis and is configured to hold over 9,000 for boxing and other combat sports, with the venue also serving as the long-time home of the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships and a regular concert site.

The main arena is formally styled as the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium. Still, it is frequently listed on fight posters and broadcast schedules under shortened titles such as Dubai Tennis Stadium or Dubai Tennis Center, while the wider complex is still often described as the Aviation Club Tennis Centre. Under the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium banner, it entered the modern boxing map in March 2022 when Probellum staged a two-night world-title double-header. On 18th March 2022, Estelle Mossely defended her IBO lightweight title against Yanina del Carmen Lescano, edging a ten-round split decision to retain the belt in what was billed as the first female world title headliner in the Middle East. The following evening, 19th March 2022, the same venue hosted “Edwards vs Waseem: Evolution,” with IBF flyweight champion Sunny Edwards outpointing Muhammad Waseem over twelve rounds to keep his title, while in the chief support, Regis Prograis stopped Tyrone McKenna in the sixth round of a WBC super-lightweight eliminator after scoring a heavy knockdown in the second. Both shows were promoted by Probellum and streamed internationally, underlining the stadium’s suitability for open-air championship boxing.

On the same date of the 19th, March 2022, the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium also staged one of the most publicised crossover boxing events of recent years, the six-round heavyweight contest between strongmen Eddie Hall and Hafþór Björnsson. Marketed as “The Heaviest Boxing Match in History,” the bout for the themed Titan weight belt ended with Björnsson scoring two knockdowns and winning a unanimous decision, again underlining the venue’s appeal for globally streamed, spectacle-driven boxing cards rather than just conventional championship promotions.

Bare-knuckle boxing has since become a major strand of the stadium’s combat-sports identity. On the 18th March 2023, BYB 16: Desert Brawl was held at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium, promoted by BYB Extreme in partnership with Core Sports. The card was advertised as the first bare-knuckle boxing event in the Gulf region. It featured fighters from a dozen nations, headlined by Jarome “The Hatchet” Hatch stopping Marko Martinjak in the first round to claim the Police Gazette World Diamond Belt. Two years later, the same arena, listed on bare-knuckle schedules under the simplified Dubai Tennis Stadium/Dubai Tennis Centre name, hosted a two-day Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship series. On 4th April 2025, BKFC 71: Dubai Day 1 – Trout vs Trinidad-Snake saw Austin Trout retain the BKFC welterweight title with a six-round split decision over Carlos Trinidad-Snake, on a card that also included a successful defence of the BKFC women’s strawweight belt by Britain Hart. On 5th April 2025, BKFC 72: Stewart vs Strydom returned to the stadium, where Kai Stewart kept his BKFC featherweight title by a wide unanimous decision over Tommy Strydom, and Jessica Borga knocked out former world champion Hannah Rankin in the opening round to win the inaugural BKFC women’s featherweight crown.

Taken together, the Probellum world-title shows, the Hall–Björnsson heavyweight spectacle, and successive bare-knuckle promotions from BYB/BKB and BKFC have turned the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium—under its various working names of Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium, Dubai Tennis Stadium and Aviation Club Tennis Centre—into one of the leading outdoor boxing and combat-sports venues in the Middle East, complementing its long-established role on the global tennis circuit.