Alex Pereira suggested that he’ll stop the persistent callout to Israel Adesanya. As the light heavyweight champion shared, he gave “The Last Stylebender” the chance, and he no longer cares if he would take it or not.
The two are known as long-time rivals who have already faced each other in four matches. “Poatan” won both his kickboxing matches with the opponent, but he lost in the last one of the two fights at UFC.
The champ wants to fully redeem himself by having another chance to fight the New Zealander, but Adesanya announced his “long” break from his MMA career after a loss to Sean Strickland at UFC 293. This later led to Pereira’s repeated callout to Adesanya, with some remarks intended to force him out of his break. Nonetheless, the younger fighter only fired back with insults without addressing Pereira’s callouts. Well, the champ said this is now over.
“I called him out in the cage after the title win, and I wanted to give him the chance, and I saw he was not giving me any respect for this – he was laughing about it and making some jokes,” said Pereira through an interpreter in an interview in France. “So for me, it doesn’t matter anymore. I gave him the chance. If he comes up, nice; if he doesn’t, it doesn’t matter.”
According to the Brazilian, the fact that Adesanya knows that he could lose again to Pereira (and ultimately lose the last pride and win he has from the four bouts they had) could be the reason why the rival still hasn’t decided about the matter. With this, despite suggesting that the callouts are now over, Pereira said that he’d still take a fight against Adesanya in case the latter chooses to have it.
“I doubt if he really wants to fight me because, talking serious, he won once against me,” Pereira said. “It was his dream to win against me, he did it. So now getting into this cage again with me, he knows everything can happen, and he can lose again, so I’m really doubting if he’s motivated to fight me again.
“Like I said, I never choose my opponents. I don’t know what happens in the future, but I never choose. If he wants to fight, I welcome him in the cage.”
