The main card for UFC 271 has been announced and it’s a doozy. Pitting Kiwi champion, Israel Adesanya and Aussie, Robert Whittaker against each other for the second time.
Let us set the scene for the first time these two met. Whittaker was welcomed into the arena in front of a home crowd in Melbourne as the champion of the middleweight category. Adesanya was a challenger, ready to take the middleweight belt and the category by storm.
In shock to the home crowd, Adesanya took the belt from Whittaker and has gone on to build a successful history making defensive period. WIth a brief detour to the light heavyweight title picture, causing the only blemish on his otherweight perfect MMA record. Adesanya enters his title defense with a 10-0 middleweight record, eliminating elite middleweight contenders like Marvin Vettori, Paulo Costa, Yoel Romero, Kelvin Gastelum and Anderson Silva, then of course, there is the man he rolled over to win the UFC middleweight crown.
Whittaker has build a case as UFC’s second greatest middleweight champion, just behind the legendary ‘Spider’ Silva, the spark was short lived after being KO’s by Adesanya. However, the former champion has defended his number one contender position with consecutive wins over Gastelum, Jared Cannonier and Darren Till en route to another show down with Adesanya.
The showdown will provide Adesanya the change to further cement his place as this generations greatest middleweight fighter, and for Whittaker, it’ll be a redemption story, for him to reclaim the belt from the man who took it from him.
Leading up to this fight, Whittaker had this to say on Adesanya’s recent title defense against Marvin Vettori.
“Adesanya is a good fighter you know, props when they’re due, he’s a great fighter.
“I think he fights really smart and tactically and that’s a good skill set to have. I think that’s an underrated thing especially at the top of the ladder, like doing what you need to do to win, exciting or not or whether for the crowd or not, you know that’s a thing to do for a lot of guys because of you know the whole ego thing.”
“But my overarching feeling of the fight was I can beat him.
“Marvin was throwing strikes and I am a better striker than Marvin, Marvin was taking him down and I think my timing’s better for takedowns than Marvin, I think I can beat him, he just looked beatable.”