UFC Insider Teases ‘Injury’ Angle While Explaining Israel Adesnya’s Loss at UFC 305
UFC Insider hints at a possible injury playing a role in Israel Adesanya’s shocking loss at UFC 305, sparking debate on the fight’s outcome and future rematch potential.
UFC color commentator Joe Rogan has come up with a fresh narrative on the Israel Adesanya vs Dricus du Plessis fight. Adesanya, who was favored by experienced campaigners like Alexander Volkanovski to win the match, failed to do so at UFC 305. Starting impressively, ‘Izzy’ slowly started to fade out as the match progressed. Such sluggishness was capitalized right away by Du Plessis as he held onto a choke that secured him the victory.
Analyzing Adesanya’s actions inside the octagon, Joe Rogan opined on his podcast that ‘The Last Stylebender’ might have been carrying an injury. Trying to justify his take, Rogan said, “[Reading from an article] Eagle-eyed Alex Pereira spots Israel Adesanya injury, draws partial confession from ‘Stylebender’… Well they clash shins a bunch of times. I mean it could have happened in the fight but the problem is he was still tired. I mean I’m sure he was injured.”
Rogan’s analysis was also backed by his guest on the show, Belal Muhammad. The UFC welterweight champion, too, mentioned that Adesanya looked tired as each of the rounds went by. The entire narrative of Adesanya probably carrying an injury started from Alex Pereira. Opining on his rival from the GLORY Kickboxing days, Pereira mentioned that Adesanya looked like he was carrying some sort of injury.
Elaborating on his stance, the Brazilian pointed out that one of Adesanya’s biggest weapons is the inside leg kick. Surprisingly, he did not use enough of it in the match against Dricus du Plessis. Such a statement was immediately backed by Adesanya, who mentioned, “It’s weird how this guy knows me...it’s like we’ve spent hours studying each other's moves and fought multiple times or sumn’. I mean that.”
Unfortunately for ‘Izzy’, the narrative was soon dismissed by the fans as they lashed out at Adesanya for trying to make excuses. Nonetheless, after Rogan siding with Pereira’s ‘injured’ narrative, this would significantly anger Dricus du Plessis. If the notion of Adesanya carrying an injury becomes popular, it would heavily hamper the credibility of the fact that Du Plessis was a dominant champion.
However, soon after the loss, Adesanya did not hesitate to give the South African his flowers. ‘The Last Stylebender’ congratulated Du Plessis for the victory and also termed him as one of the African UFC champions. Thus, with the likes of Joe Rogan and Alex Pereira adding a different angle to the UFC 305 main event, it remains to be seen how the champion reacts.