"He's got many screws loose" - Israel Adesanya reacts to Sean Strickland knocking out his sparring partners during training

Sean Strickland (left) and Israel Adesanya (right) [Images Courtesy: Getty]

Israel Adesanya doesn't interact with his sparring partners the way Sean Strickland does.

On his Freestylebender Clips channel on YouTube, Adesanya had a chat with the reigning UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski.

While the reigning UFC champions discussed differing perceptions of sparring partner protocols among fighters, Adesanya said:

"Sean Strickland, he's a bad motherf***er. Like literally bad, a rotten apple. But I like the guy. He's funny and he likes to talk sh** as well. His standup, I've seen him do more damage on YouTube in sparring than in his fights, put it that way. I've seen his sparring footages and I would never spar with an idiot like that. I've hurt people in sparring before." [sic]

Adesanya affirmed his conviction that one should never hurt their training partners and spar safely and effectively. He continued:

"I'm just like, 'oh sh**, my bad,' or I'll pull back like with a body shot or whatever. But I've seen what he does. I'm just like and he's talking shit... I don't like to hurt people even though that's our job. But I like to make sure they're able to come back the next day to do their work. Also to give me work because you need your teammates... He's got many screws loose." [sic]

Watch the video below:

Adesanya and Strickland had a highly publicized trash-talking exchange at the UFC 276 press conference ahead of their respective fights.

Sean Strickland's current situation

Strickland is presently the No.7- ranked contender in the UFC’s middleweight division. He has an overall mixed martial arts record of 25 wins and 4 losses.

In his last fight, Sean Strickland got knocked out by Alex Pereira in the first round of their clash at UFC 276 on July 2.

Per Sean Strickland’s IG https://t.co/lgI7NocefI

Prior to that defeat, Strickland was in the top five rankings and had amassed a six fight winning streak, besting Jack Hermansson, Uriah Hall, Krzystof Jotko, Brendan Allen, Jack Marshman, and Nordine Taleb. He was teetering on the precipice of securing a title shot. A win over Pereira could possibly have made him the next title-challenger. As things played out, it is now Alex Pereira who will battle 'The Last Stylebender' for the middleweight throne at UFC 281 in November.