Adesanya vows to show Du Plessis “the error of his ways”

Ahead of their UFC 305 bout this weekend, Israel Adesanya has promised to “show” Dricus du Plessis as the South African seems not to “understand the error of his ways.” The Last Stylebender made this known in response to a statement from Du Plessis that he was the first African MMA champion to take an MMA title back to Africa. 

Adesanya, a former two-time middleweight champion, who is also a Nigerian based in New Zealand, did not take kindly to that statement, seeing it as belittling the effort and achievements of he and other former champions like Francis Ngannou and Kamaru Usman. This statement did not only annoy Adesanya but also Ghanaian-born  Abdul Razak Alhassan.

Addressing the issue with TMZ Sport, Adesnya called on his opponent to take “accountability for his remarks,” stating that Du Plessis was speaking from a place of privilege. I just want him to take accountability for his remarks,” Adesanya said. “I’m also glad my friend Abdul Razak (Alhassan) said it before his fight about three weeks ago, saying, ‘I respect Dricus, but he’s a b*tch for what he said.’ He’s a b*tch because Dricus is saying, ‘I trained in Africa. I do this in Africa,’ and people like Razak and myself (are out there) who are forced to flee our own country because of a better opportunity. 

“He’ll never understand that because he lives behind the f*cking gates of his privileged life in South Africa, and he’s able to do that there. So someone like Francis, who had to cross the desert to go overseas to go train – if you know Francis’ story, you can’t call him not a real African champion because he didn’t train in Africa. Like, bro – are you f*cking kidding? The guy got sent back out to the desert six, seven times to go die, and he survived.”

Izzy noted that Du Plessis would never have been champion without the effort of those before him who paved the way: “Even without Francis being champion, without myself being champion, without Kamaru being champion, he would have never been champion. 

“What kind of mindset is it that you see three African champions, and you’re going to be the fourth one? You could have said it would be a great honor to be out of the legends of African champions that have been in the UFC. He tries to take it all for himself. That’s a colonist mindset. He doesn’t understand the error of his ways, but I will show him the way.” He ended it all by stating that even though Du Plessis was champion, he would never be one of the three kings.