There’s nothing like some fiery corner work going into the last round of a fight.
In a fight where he was down on the scorecards, Alex Pereira’s coaches told him he had to go out and knock out Israel Adesanya to win the fight. He did that and is the new UFC middleweight champion.
The audio was captured and translated, and Dana White loved every second of it.
“I don’t know if you guys have headphones over on your side, but the corner in Pereira’s corner that round was like straight out of a movie,” White told the media during the UFC 281 post-fight press conference.
Pereira’s corner two minutes before he became a UFC champion ? #UFC281 pic.twitter.com/BV7gEgBP9n
— ESPN MMA (@espnmma) November 13, 2022
“I wanted to hear what the corner work was going to be, so I put the headphones on. One of his trainers, I don’t know who it was, was like, ‘you’re losing this fu*king fight. You need to knock him out in this round. You have to move forward. You have to throw punches in bunches you have to throw combinations. Let your fu*king hands go. You’re going to be a world champion in five minutes.’ And then he gets up and goes out there. And it was seriously straight out of the movie,” White ended.
Pereira was indeed down on the scorecards 39-37, as they were released shortly after the fight.
#UFC281 Official Scorecard: @AlexPereiraUFC vs Israel Adesanya
See every scorecard here ?? https://t.co/FG22YYBzCw pic.twitter.com/fczwLCnvnf
— UFC News (@UFCNews) November 13, 2022
The fourth-round cornering was eerily similar to what happened to Leon Edwards before he knocked out Kamaru Usman at UFC 278 in August.
Well, fiery fourth-round cornering might be the best base in title fights now.
Maybe.