Israel Adesanya's coach has admitted that Sean Strickland created many problems for 'The Last Stylebender' and his team at UFC 293.
This past weekend's UFC 293 pay-per-view saw one of the biggest upsets in middleweight history as Strickland beat Adesanya via unanimous decision. In what was supposed to be a rather easy outing for 'The Last Stylebender', 'Tarzan' completely dominated the fight.
Speaking of the same during an interview with Submission Radio, Israel Adesanya's coach Eugene Bareman spoke about how his pupil could've and should've won the fight and that he had an off night.
Bareman also acknowledged the fact that Sean Strickland is the reason Adesanya struggled, rather than any other extraneous factors:
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"He knows that capability-wise that was a fight that he could've won and should've won and he didn't perform. Respect like, when I say, when someone says, when a coach says or anybody who knows the sport says that he had an off night or he didn't perform, that doesn't mean, that's not an excuse, they're acknowledging that the other person made them not perform."
Catch Eugene Bareman's comments in the video below (1:57):
Israel Adesanya vs. Sean Strickland: Eugene Bareman makes bold demand for a rematch
Despite being outperformed by Sean Strickland four rounds to one at UFC 293, Eugene Bareman believes Israel Adesanya can beat the new UFC middleweight champion in a rematch with relative ease.
Speaking at the post-fight press conference, Eugene Bareman stated that they couldn't get Israel Adesanya to follow their gameplan, which made the difference in the fight. Further claiming to have asked the UFC matchmaker Mick Maynard about a rematch next weekend, Bareman had this to say:
“I asked Mick if we could have the rematch next weekend. Whether he grants that, I’m not sure but, just very confident that we can change the outcome of this fight with very minor adjustments. What I’m saying is, we couldn’t get Israel to enact our plan, there wasn’t much cohesion in the corner, you have nights like this, but we can do the rematch tomorrow and I think we can have a good night.”
Watch Eugene Bareman's statement from the 4:16 mark of the video below: