"It was more of a forceful sexual assault by Stylebender" - Sean Strickland trolls Paulo Costa for going from "MMA to professional clown" after Israel Adesanya loss

Sean Strickland (left) and Paulo Costa (right) [Images via @SnailSonnen and @mma_bang on Twitter]

Sean Strickland recently took a dig at Paulo Costa for his humiliating loss to Israel Adesanya. Responding to a tweet from Costa, Strickland joked that the Brazilian was sexually assaulted by Adesanya moments after their championship bout in 2020.

Strickland also mocked Costa's current reputation and standing in the MMA community. He wrote on Twitter:

"In all fairness to Costa I wouldn't call him gay, it was more of a forceful sexual assault by Style bender [referring to Adesanya], I'm just happy he didn't decide to penetrate you.... Jokes aside man you're hard to take seriously. Mma to professional clown, definitely a step up for you..."

In all fairness to Costa I wouldn't call him gay, it was more of a forceful sexual assault by Style bender, I'm just happy he didn't decide to penetrate you.... Jokes aside man you're hard to take seriously. Mma to professional clown, definitely a step up for you... twitter.com/BorrachinhaMMA…

Paulo Costa challenged Israel Adesanya for the middleweight title at UFC 253 in September 2020. Costa was thoroughly dominated by 'The Last Stylebender' en route to a second-round TKO loss. To humiliate him some more, Adesanya pretended to emulate a humping gesture as the referee called a halt to the action.

Watch a clip of the incident below:

Paulo Costa's excuse for his loss to Israel Adesanya

Paulo Costa worsened his image by ridiculously blaming his loss to Israel Adesanya on alcohol. According to Costa, he consumed a bottle of wine the night before the fight as he was struggling to fall asleep. 'Borrachinha' said on his YouTube channel in Portugese (Quotes translated by YouTube's closed captions):

“I was kind of drunk [when] I fought, maybe, on hangover. I couldn’t sleep because of the [leg] cramps. Keep in mind that the fight happens at 9 a.m. [local time], we have to wake up at 5 to get ready, stretch, wrap the hands. The UFC told us to wake up at 5 in the morning to go to the arena to fight. I hadn’t slept until 2:30."

He added:

"It was my mistake and I don’t blame anyone else, it was something I chose [to do], but, in order to try to sleep, because I had to sleep since I was awake for 24 hours, I had wine, too much wine, a bottle [of wine] to try to black out. I had a glass and didn’t work. Two glasses, it didn’t work. Half bottle, didn’t work. I had it all.”

Watch Paulo Costa weigh in on his loss to Israel Adesanya below:

Having started his UFC journey with a five-fight win streak, Costa has lost momentum after his loss to Adesanya. In his next outing, the Brazilian dropped a unanimous decision to Marvin Vettori and is now out of the title picture.