Watch: Israel Adesanya breaks down his high-level chess match with Robert Whittaker at UFC 271
Israel Adesanya made his fourth successful middleweight title defense against Robert Whittaker in a title rematch at UFC 271. 'Izzy' reeled in a close unanimous decision after going the distance of five rounds.
Adesanya recently weighed in on his experience of being in a 'high-level chess match' for five rounds. According to the UFC middleweight king, one cannot afford to lose focus for a moment during such a high caliber matchup.
However, Israel Adesanya believes he would have done better by relying more on his instincts like he did in the first matchup. 'The Last Stylebender' recently said on his YouTube channel:
"You have to be fully focused and zoned in. You can't lose a step, like you cannot have a lapse in judgement you know. But also, one thing I failed to do in this fight is trust my instinct. And ask questions. Cause the first fight right, I went in there and I just felt like hmm. As I was going through the gameplan I was like 'uh, some other stuff was working outside'. So I just called audible and I felt like, 'okay I can match this guy's intensity'. And I trusted my instinct. And yeah, I had killer instinct in that fight. Killer instinct."
Watch Israel Adesanya weigh in on his title rematch against Robert Whittaker below:
Robert Whittaker believes he defeated Israel Adesanya
Although Robert Whittaker came up on the short side of the decision, he did win a few rounds according to the judges' scorecards. While judges Jacob Montalvo and Doug Crosby gave the championship rounds to Whittaker, judge Mike Beltran had him winning in round 2.
However, 'Bobby Knuckles' believes he did enough to win the fight altogether. The 31-year old told reporters at the UFC 271 post-fight scrum:
"I thought I did enough. I thought I did enough. Breaking it down, I think I lost the first round, I put myself back together. I think I beat him to every punch. I got takedowns. I thought I did enough, but it is what it is. That’s how work goes in the office. So I want to go back, evolve some more and get better. Fine tune the things that I’ve been working on, and come back a better man."
Watch Robert Whittaker's appearance at the UFC 271 post-fight presser below: