Israel Adesanya Suffers First UFC Career Loss

March 7, 2021
Israel Adesanya
Image Source: Premium Times

By Adedapo Adesanya

Nigeria-born New Zealand professional mixed martial artist, Israel Adesanya, suffered his first career defeat when he lost to Jan Blachowicz in the early hours of Sunday.

The defeat of Adesanya by the Polish fighter sees him retaining the light heavyweight title.

The Last Stylebender, as Adesanya is popularly called, suffered his first career loss in Ultimate Fight Club (UFC) at the UFC APEX in Las Vegas, USA.

The Polish fighter defeated Adesanya via a unanimous decision of 49-46, 49-45, 49-45.

After a tight opening three rounds, Blachowicz took over in the fourth and fifth as big takedowns in each championship round saw the 38-year-old control things on the ground.

The 31-year-old Nigerian-Kiwi, who entered the fight with a 20-0 record that features 15 knockouts, now has 20-1.

Adesanya’s eight-fight win streak came to an end against Blachowicz, who first took the 205-pound belt in 2020 after stopping Dominick Reyes.

A Round by Round Analysis

ROUND 1: Calm and composed start from both the fighters here. Adesanya just makes it look too easy. Doesn’t he? A very close first round comes to an end. Blachowicz was the one pushing Adesanya to a corner at the beginning but the challenger connected with a few decent hits towards the end.

ROUND 2: A couple of nice jabs early on from Blachowicz. And they connected pretty sweet. Adesanya goes down to the floor. But he gets up immediately. Advantage to the defending champ from minutes five to ten. Unintentional low blow from Izzy and referee Herb Dean brings in a brief pause.

ROUND 3: What a start to the round! Blachowicz connects with clean jabs first. He went for the takedown but Adesanya countered and took advantage from there. The challenger then hit some good shots of his own. Blachowicz looked dazed for a while but he came back with a couple of late punches to close out the round.

This has been a fight loaded with kicks so far. We could see a string of jabs but the legs have majorly done the talking. Guess it’s a round each right now.

ROUND 4: Think Izzy has two rounds to Blachowicz’s one. The champ has to be aggressive now. And there’s a takedown from Blachowicz. The Light Heavyweight champion is doing everything he can to stay on top of Adesanya. Almost four minutes now. Good domination from Blachowicz. He wore down the middleweight titleholder right at the centre of the Octagon for close to 250 seconds.

ROUND 5: One final round today! They’ve gone tit for tat so far. Another crucial takedown from Blachowicz at the half-way mark. Think the Polish champ will see this round off in a similar manner. Izzy has somehow managed his way out of serious damage here. Blachowicz isn’t able to turn Izzy the other way round.

In the other co-main event, Amanda Nunes (21-4) easily defended her featherweight crown by defeating Megan Anderson (11-5).

Aljamain Sterling (20-3) won the bantamweight title after Petr Yan (15-2) lost by disqualification.

Adedapo Adesanya

Adedapo Adesanya is a journalist, polymath, and connoisseur of everything art. When he is not writing, he has his nose buried in one of the many books or articles he has bookmarked or simply listening to good music with a bottle of beer or wine. He supports the greatest club in the world, Manchester United F.C.

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