Reigning UFC middleweight champion, Israel Adesanya has claimed that he will secure “another easy bag” on February 12. at UFC 271 – ahead of his championship rematch with former titleholder, Robert Whittaker.
Attempting to secure the fourth successful defense of his middleweight title and his second career win against Whittaker, Adesanya first defeated the Auckland-born former champion with a second round title unification knockout at UFC 243 in October 2019.
The Nigerian-New Zealander has since managed to land a trio of successful title defenses against Yoel Romero, Paulo Costa, and in his most recent win, handed Marvin Vettori a second career loss in the pair’s June rematch at UFC 263.
Israel Adesanya has suffered just one professional loss: a unanimous decision defeat to Jan Blachowicz last March
Commenting on his training camp ahead of the bout with Whittaker, Adesanya has claimed that his successful period of preparation ahead of the rematch has laid the foundations for him to land “another easy bag” in his UFC tenure.
“I don’t know about another death note the second time around,” Israel Adesanya told Stake. “Those things come to me whenever they come to me. But let me tell you, I never get complacent, this makes me fired up. It’s another easy bag, so I cannot afford to fumble this bag. For me, I’ve done the work. This is one of the best camps I have had, and I still have hard training to go. Just being present and having fun is important. I look forward to the work in this one, I look forward to coming at him.”
“There has been no cutting corners this time,” Israel Adesanya said. “It’s made me even more motivated to do it again and do it more decisively if that’s even possible. That is my motivation for this fight, to get up and beat him again in an even more devastating fashion.”
Providing his prediction for the showdown in Houston, Texas – Adesanya predicted that he will “f*ck” Whittaker up for the second time.
“My prediction is that I am going to f*ck (Robert) Whittaker up, again,” Israel Adesanya said. “He can’t stand with me, so I know he will be forced to grapple. Last time he said, ‘Kevin Gastelum has been given the blueprint on how to beat Adesanya’ and now he’s saying, ‘Jan (Blachowicz) has given the blueprint’. … he needs to write his own blueprint. If he wants to copy someone else’s work, then, by all means, try, because it went so well last time for him when we fought.”
In the time since his knockout loss against Adesanya, Whittaker has embarked on a three-fight winning run against Darren Till, Jared Cannonier, and common-foe, Kelvin Gastelum – handing the trio unanimous decision losses.