“If he was on my team, I would tell him, ‘Don’t have this fight now,'” the Brazilian told reporters at a media day. “He had a brilliant career, but he sees that he can’t succeed in fights with me, so I would definitely advise him not to go to this fight now. It was necessary to fight one or two fights, and then come back and try again.”
“I don’t know. Perhaps in his team the last word remains with him. We are not set up that way. You have to guide your athlete, because if someone asks a real fighter if he wants to fight, he will always say yes, but sometimes it doesn’t happen at the right time.”
“That’s why you have to have a team where people understand each other. You need to forget about your ego, and then everything will work. Glover Teixeira and I talk a lot. He has a lot of experience and I definitely listen to him. I don’t think Adesanya is listening to what he is told. I’m sure a lot of people told him not to, but he had his say. His fighting ego took over. Okay, let’s do it”
Pereira is confident that this fight will put an end to his confrontation with the Nigerian, whom he defeated twice in kickboxing before defeating him in mixed martial arts.
“I will beat him now and we will never see each other again. I know how he fights, how he works, and therefore I know how to beat him.”
Recall that the middleweight title fight between Alex Pereira and Israel Adesanya will be the main event of the UFC 287 tournament, which will be held on April 8 in Miami.