UFC champion Israel Adesanya has noted his disappointment despite defeating Jared Cannonier on Saturday night.
In the main event of UFC 276 this past weekend, Israel Adesanya eased to a solid unanimous decision win over Jared Cannonier to ensure he successfully retained his UFC middleweight title in Las Vegas. The bout went similar to how many expected but after it came to an end, a lot of fans were left feeling unsatisfied by what theyâd seen from both Adesanya and Cannonier.
The pair didnât exactly light up the T-Mobile Arena and even though there were a lot of respectful words flying around for how professional Adesanyaâs performance was, a lot of his critics still want to see more from him.
During a post-fight interview, âThe Last Stylebenderâ gave an honest assessment of how he thought he did.
âMy team know this, the first thing they say is âyou have high expectations of yourselfâ. The whole team, people who actually know, ah, he had an off night. We all have a job to do, sometimes you have an off night, mine just happens to be in front of the world, and Iâve had a lot of on nights. I just had an off night tonight which is why I was like, meh. But, f*** it, masterclass.â
âHe couldnât do much to me, he touched me a little bit which I didnât like, but I canât get touched by a guy like that. I still feel like Iâm the best, but at the same time, itâs the expectation I put on myself, and I said before the fight what Iâm gonna do, I hate not getting it done the way I said I was going to.â
The next step
In what could prove to be an incredibly difficult fight for him, Adesanya looks set to defend the belt against Alex Pereira in his next outing.
âPoatanâ moved to 3-0 in the UFC on the same card last weekend as he put Sean Stricklandâs lights out with an emphatic KO.
The former kickboxing sensation has beaten Adesanya twice before in that particular art form, but in mixed martial arts, the champion clearly feels like he holds the advantage.