UFC 300 could've had an entirely different main event, according to Israel Adesanya.
The former middleweight champion said during an appearance on This Past Weekend with Theo Von that he accepted a proposed championship bout with Dricus Du Plessis at the upcoming April 13 milestone event, however, the current 185-pound titleholder did not accept the fight.
“There’s some things that were meant to happen. They summoned me,” Adesanya told the comedian during the podcast that was posted Tuesday. “They summoned me for 300 and I was like, ‘Ya, let’s roll,’ but their side didn’t want it.”
After weeks of speculation and rumours, the UFC announced Adesanya’s former rival Alex Pereira would defend his 205-pound title against former champion Jamahal Hill in the featured UFC 300 bout.
Adesanya and Du Plessis were targeted to fight in September at UFC 293 in Australia while Adesanya was still champion, however, Du Plessis was unavailable for that event due to injury. Adesanya ended up fighting Sean Strickland instead, losing by unanimous decision. He announced afterwards he had decided to take an undetermined break from the sport to allow his body to heal after regularly competing injured.
Du Plessis won the title from Strickland in January at UFC 297 when they fought to a split decision that went the challenger’s way. Du Plessis absorbed 173 significant strikes in his five-round win over Strickland, and Adesanya acknowledged he had “just fought Strickland so maybe he had some niggly injuries but hey we all got niggles and whatnot.”
The organization has not confirmed Du Plessis’s first defence will be against Adesanya, although that’s the matchup that makes the most sense if the former champion is healthy and ready to return to the cage.
The UFC has never held an event in Africa, and UFC president Dana White told reporters in January he thinks Du Plessis would be befitting of headlining the UFC’s inaugural event in Africa now that he's a champion.
Adesanya is Nigerian-born and Du Plessis is from South Africa, so an event on the continent headlined by an all-African championship matchup of that calibre would be tremendously compelling.
The UFC was unable to set up an event in Africa when the organization had three African champions: Adesanya and Kamaru Usman of Nigeria and Cameroon’s Francis Ngannou.
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