Israel Adesanya vs Sean Strickland Prediction: Betting on the New Zealand fighter

Israel Adesanya will once again defend the UFC middleweight division title. The contender this time will be Sean Strickland.

After a promising kickboxing career, Adesanya came to MMA in 2012, won twenty consecutive fights, became the middleweight champion, and decided to take the belt in a higher category. But Jan Błachowicz brought him back down to earth, and he continued his dominance in his native middleweight division.

That lasted until the league pulled up an old familiar champion, Alex Pereira, who had beaten him twice in kickboxing. Pereira knocked out Adesanya last year in the UFC, but in April 2023, Israel still broke a frustrating tradition, got a rematch, and reclaimed the belt.

It is impossible to praise Sean Strickland as we did Israel Adesanya. He is of a completely different type. Sean loves to swing his fists, which usually takes much damage, but he is stoic. His skills and character are enough to be at the top but not enough to take the belt. Alex Pereira and Jared Cannonnier proved that last year.

However, Sean is not discouraged and takes on challenges. This year, he has fought twice already (he beat Nassourdine Imavov and knocked out Abus Magomedov), and now he's going out for the main fight of his life.

Strickland loves close-quarters fighting, but Adesanya won't give him that opportunity. Why should he? Working perfectly, smashing from a distance on the floor, he will quietly score points until he finds the moment for the decisive strike. And when he does, Strickland will either lose concentration due to fatigue or simply freak out.

To be honest, it's hard to find anything that can be used against the champion without jokes. Well, Adesanya could suffer a sudden injury or purposely put his head in the way of a punch to test how well he's holding it - but would you risk putting money on that probability?