Appearing to take another dig at long-standing rival, former two-time middleweight titleholder, Israel Adesanya amid the former’s claim of corruption during his boxing career – fellow former division champion, Alex Pereira has claimed maybe he would pursue a 2027 return akin to Adesanya, inside the squared circle.
Pereira, a former undisputed middleweight champion under the banner of the UFC, is slated to return to the Octagon in the main event of UFC 295 next month at Madison Square Garden, taking on former light heavyweight champion, Jiri Prochazka in a massive vacant title fight in ‘The Big Apple’.
Sidelined since he co-headlined UFC 291 back in July, Alex Pereira landed a return to the winner’s enclosure with a title-eliminator win over former champion and common-foe to Adesanya, Jan Blachowicz, in a close split decision win.
As for Adesanya, the City Kickboxing staple has yet to return to the Octagon since he dropped his middleweight crown for the second time in the space of a year back in September, suffering a shock upset decision loss to common-opponent, Sean Strickland.
Alex Pereira appears to fire shots at Israel Adesanya again
And claiming he would not return to mixed martial arts competition until 2027, Adesanya pointed at apparent corruption in his close friend, Francis Ngannou’s split decision loss to WBC heavyweight champion, Tyson Fury – akin to his own time in the squared circle.
“Boxing as a sport is beautiful,” Israel Adesanya posted on his official X account. “Boxing as a business is corrupt as f*ck! For example… March 2015, in this clip I get illegally hit and my opponent doesn’t get a point deducted. I rock him and put him on the canvas and it’s considered a slip. I throw a superman punch rocking him again and get warned cuz my foot was off the ground and it’s “illegal”. They must not know about David Tua’s leaping left hook. Anywhore (sic), I’ve done my time in boxing as a “rookie” to the game and it felt easy to me. I decided to pursue MMA because in my heart as a kickboxer I knew some nerd in pj’s made of sandpaper could beat me without throwing a single strike. Having to learn a whole new set of skills from scratch was very humbling, but it paid off in the long run. It was fun but I’ll never box again, I prefer to use all my weapons in a real fight.”
And likely in response to Adesanya’s post, Brazilian favorite, Alex Pereira posted “Maybe I’ll do a boxing fight in 2027” on his official Instagram account.
ALEX PEREIRA IN A BOXING RING
(h/t @AlexPereiraUFC) pic.twitter.com/jBjOu3MCey
— ESPN MMA (@espnmma) October 30, 2023
Would you like to see Alex Pereira fight Israel Adesanya again in the future?