Dan Hooker reveals Israel Adesanya is nervous ahead of Robert Whittaker rematch at UFC 271
Dan Hooker gave an update on his teammate Israel Adesanya's state of mind heading into his rematch with Robert Whittaker at UFC 271.
According to 'The Hangman', Adesanya isn't taking Whittaker lightly even though he dominated in their initial fight. During an interview with James Lynch for LowKick MMA, Hooker said:
"He's good. He's definitely in a good place. From the interactions that I've had with him... I guess with the rematch, especially the way that the first fight went, you can kind of – not necessarily underestimate your opponent – but you can take it a little bit lightly because you know you put on such a dominant performance right there. It might be hard to get up for the training but it's not like that. Like he said to me this morning, he said, 'You know I'm nervous.' That's good, you know. He's got that nervous energy which you need."
Check out Dan Hooker's insight on Israel Adesanya below:
Adesanya and Whittaker first met back in a middleweight title unification bout at UFC 243 in 2019. 'The Last Stylebender' made quick work of 'The Reaper', scoring the KO win at the 3:33 mark of the second round.
The Kiwi fighter has since defended the 185-pound title thrice. Meanwhile, Whittaker clawed his way back into title contention by racking up unanimous decision wins over Darren Till, Jared Cannonier and Kelvin Gastelum.
Robert Whittaker was unsure about his return after losing to Israel Adesanya
Robert Whittaker recently revealed that losing to Israel Adesanya almost marked the end of his career. During an exclusive interview with Fox Sports Australia, Whittaker shared:
"After the loss with Israel, I took a step to the left. So, I left the game and I didn't know whether I would come back to the game. Because at the time, I wasn't enjoying anything. I didn't enjoy the lead-up to the fight. I didn't enjoy fight week. I didn't enjoy media. I wasn't enjoying myself day to day and I had to understand why I was doing things, how I was doing things, how I wanted to do things and where I wanted to go."
Watch Robert Whittaker recall his loss to Israel Adesanya below:
Right now, though, 'The Reaper' appears to be as confident as ever. The former middleweight champ claimed in an interview with Morning Kombat that he believes he has improved more than Adesanya since their first meeting.