After years of fighting exclusively in championship bouts, Adesanya is prepared to take on a few guys in non-title fights so long as it gets him back in the cage soon.
Israel Adesanya hasn’t given up on winning back his UFC middleweight title. For now, though, the former two-time 185 pound champion just wants to fight.
Adesanya suffered a defeat at the hands of current champ Dricus Du Plessis back in August, getting submitted off an awkward grappling exchange in the fourth round of their championship bout (watch it here). After losing his belt to Sean Strickland in September 2023, “The Last Stylebender” took a long break to breath and make major changes to how he prepared for fights. Now he’s looking to get right back into action.
In a new interview with Adam Carolla, Izzy explained how he expects to have a non-title fight or two before getting back to the belt and a potential rematch with Du Plessis.
“Yeah, of course,” he said of fighting Du Plessis again. “That’ll come later on. But you know, right now, after I just fought [Dricus], I don’t think it’s gonna be immediately. I’d rather just fight, not really for the belt, just fight for fighting sake.”
“I’m still Israel,” he said of his status in the middleweight division. “I’ll let them call me out or whatever. At the moment, I wanna fight one more time before the end of this year or early next year, but I don’t know yet. I’m just training, building off where we left off, and I’ll get the call at some point with a with a few options. I’m sure Dana will hit me up at some point.”
Aside from Du Plessis, the obvious other option for a fight is Sean Strickland.
“He’s gonna fight Du Plessis first,” Adesanya said. “Yeah, I think he’s next. So we’ll see how that plays out, see how the Rob [Whittaker] fight plays out [at UFC 308]. And there’s some other young guys on the come up.”
That list of young guys includes “Fighting Nerd” Caio Borralho, who claimed Israel ‘gave up’ in his UFC 305 fight against Du Plessis. That sounds like a pretty decent matchup for Izzy, certainly one that’s more fan friendly than a bout with Nassourdine Imavov, the only other top five middleweight “Stylebender” hasn’t faced yet.
Who would you like to see Israel Adesanya fight next? Let us know in the comments below, Maniacs!