Somebody’s ‘0’ is gotta go as an unstoppable force will collide with an immovable object. The undefeated UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya will take on another undefeated Paulo Costa.
A potential showdown between Adesanya and Costa was always on board before a shouler injury had Costa out for 6 months. Adesanya then took on multiple time challenger Yoel Romero at UFC 248 in March. Though Adesanya got the job done, the fight turned out to be rather uneventful. He also received a lot of criticism for not pulling in the trigger often.
Speaking with MMA Junkie, Adesanya (19-0 MMA, 8-0 UFC) addressed the issue. However he claims to use the criticism as fuel for his fire to tame the mighty Costa.
“I look forward to this game because a lot of people after that fight – it’s perfect: I let them sleep on me,” Adesanya told MMA Junkie. “In the movie of my life, even in my documentary – like every movie, things are going great and then you need, ‘Oh, something bad’s happened,’ and then you need the finish of the movie where it rises up again.
Adesanya then pointed that his fight with Costa will resemble the UFC 126 classic between Anderson Silva and Vitor Belfort. Adesanya resembling the fluidity of Silva and Costa resembling the sheer physicality of Belfort back the day. According to him, the MMA community is sleeping on him just like they did on Silva. The result as we all know saw the iconic Silva’s front kick knockout of Belfort.
“The last fight, because of the criticism unjustly that I got, the dip, it’s like the negative part of the movie. And then this bit is going to be the bit where I just blow everything out of the water and I just rise to the occasion and everyone is like, ‘I can’t believe he did that.’ You guys are going to be really surprised. It’s going to be etches of UFC 126, (Vitor) Belfort vs. (Anderson) Silva, that type of (expletive). You’re going to be really surprised at how this fight plays out because everyone is already counting me out.”
Costa (13-0 MMA, 5-0 UFC) is coming of a split decision win over Yoel Romero at UFC 241 back in August last year.
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