Dana White “absolutely” wants to book an immediate rematch between Sean Strickland and Israel Adesanya after last night’s UFC 293 event.
Strickland (28-5 MMA) challenged Adesanya (24-3 MMA) for the promotion’s undisputed middleweight title in the headliner of Saturday’s pay-per-view event in Sydney, Australia.
Although he was a massive underdog, Sean Strickland ultimately proved his doubters wrong, scoring a lopsided unanimous decision win over Israel Adesanya to become the new UFC middleweight champion of the world.
It was an incredible performance from Strickland, one which saw him drop ‘Stylebender‘ with a right hand in the late stages of the opening round.
Despite receiving an immediate rematch following his previous title loss to Alex Pereira and having gone just 4-3 over his past seven Octagon appearances, UFC President Dana White believes Izzy “absolutely” deserves an immediate rematch against Strickland.
“I think you do the rematch, absolutely,” White told the media. “The rematch is interesting. That could be the thing, too. When you think about you’re going into the [Alex] Pereira fight, such a big fight, and you’ve been in there with this guy so many times, and then you overlook Strickland. You come in and I don’t know. I don’t know the answers to these questions, but Israel does, and I’m looking forward to hearing it.”
Dana White continued (h/t MMAMania):
“Israel looked like he was in slow motion. He looked like he couldn’t get off. He looked like he was really stiff tonight. He looked very slow. Only Israel knows what’s going on, there are a million things that could have gone wrong. Some days, you wake up, and you’re just not there. He looked bone-dry tonight, standing up really tall. He looked very slow. He looked like he couldn’t get off at all. Even in the fifth round, when everybody knew he needed a knockout to win the fight, there was no sense of urgency to try to finish the fight.”
Do you agree with Dana White that Israel Adesanya should receive an immediate rematch against Sean Strickland? If not, who would you like the see Strickland fight next?
