Israel Adesanya is gearing up to take on Alex Pereira again at UFC 287 and this time feels he has nothing to lose.
Former UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya will be taking on a familiar foe at UFC 287. He will be facing champion Alex Pereira in the main event of the Miami card. This bout will be the fourth time these two will fight. They fought twice in kickboxing and once in MMA. Pereira has won all meetings, but Adesanya is calm coming into this immediate rematch. He feels he has nothing to lose this time around.
The first bout in the UFC was at UFC 281 in November. In the lead-up to that fight, there was a lot of emphasis on the previous kickboxing meetings. Now Pereira has shown that he can defeat Adesanya in the cage as well. None of this is bothering Adesanya and he spoke about why he feels so calm and what he learned from the loss on The Rock.
“Benefits from this loss? I have nothing to lose” he said. “That’s the best thing I can say, I have nothing to lose. The worst has already happened. So it’s like, what’s he going to do it again? The worst has happened. I’ll tell you one thing, I know how to beat this guy. I know in my heart I know how to beat he knows I know how to beat him. Yeah, that’s the thing.”
Israel Adesanya has learned not to react to the hate he gets online following his loss
The loss at UFC 281 was the first for Adesanya at middleweight in his professional MMA career. Immediately after the fight he showed up to the post-fight presser and spoke to the media. He did not hang his head, instead, he explained why he was grateful for the opportunity. Now he is sharing how he has learned not to make split reactions to hate from online trolls or from his opponent.
“I’m already motivated to whoop this guy’s ass but that was a bit, something else happened two weeks ago, some idiot said about you know, African fighters I don’t want to give him any attention, right? Yeah, but, I didn’t, I don’t react that’s one thing if I tell anybody don’t react, respond,” he said. “That is one of the things I learned through therapy that really benefited me because a lot of men in this day and age, they just react, something happens they tweet about it, or they go stab someone or they get into a fight and they hurt themselves. Just don’t react. Take your time, internalize that motion and response. So for me, I internalize that I was like, that’s weird. Like, why are you so obsessed with me?”
Adesanya brought up the fact that Pereira has been making reaction videos about him. He said he feels that Pereira is upset by the way he lives his life. He is extra motivated for this bout both to finally get a win over a longtime foe and to regain his lost belt back.
