Israel Adesanya wins Yoel Romero fight by unanimous decision at UFC 248
New Zealand superstar Israel Adesanya has retained his UFC middleweight strap, and maintained his undefeated record, with an underwhelming, and controversial, unanimous points decision win over Cuban Yoel Romero.
Israel Adesanya won the fight, but lost the crowd.
Enter Bobby Knuckles.
On a crazy night of fights at UFC 248 in Las Vegas, Australia’s inaugural UFC champion Robert Whittaker – somewhat incredibly – ended up winning out at an event he was supposed to attend, then missed, and wound up being highlighted by the greatest woman’s UFC fight ever.
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One of the greatest fights period, too.
But more on that shortly.
First, we need to dissect the fallout from a middleweight title bout where, challenging for the gold strap Whittaker owned as recently as October, Adesanya won a contentious decision win over Cuban Yoel Romero.
When the fight concluded after five rounds, the crowd booed loudly.
Then the scorecards were read (48-47, 48-47, 49-46), they booed louder again.
A few days earlier, Adesanya had said Whittaker would need to win at least three more times before joining a list of future opponents that includes, next, Brazilian Paulo Costa and, after that, potentially a superfight with Jon Jones.
Yet speaking with The Daily Telegraph, UFC president Dana White hinted the fighter dubbed Bobby Knuckles could be getting another shot at his gold strap before Christmas.
“It won’t be three,” White laughed when quizzed on Whittaker rematching the Kiwi who dethroned him at UFC 243.
“I love when fighters say that but it won’t be three.”
Better for Whittaker, nobody will wake on Monday morning talking a superfight for Adesanya after a fight even White conceded “sucked”.
The UFC boss quickly added Whittaker was not only back in training, but “ready to go” after being forced out of fight against American Jarod Cannonier on this Las Vegas card, for personal reasons.
“And I’m telling you those reasons he couldn’t fight, it’s one of the most stand up f…ing things I’ve heard in my life,” White said.
“The guy is a real man.
“It’s easy to become a world champion, become famous and lose your f…ing mind. Lose sight of what’s important in life.
“Rob Whittaker doesn’t have that problem … he’s the real deal.”
Another fighter, undoubtedly, now stamped with ‘real deal’ status is UFC women’s strawweight champion Weili Zhang, who defended her title with an incredibly gutsy split decision win over Polsih gangster Joanna Jędrzejczyk (48-47, 48-47, 47-48).
Afterwards, both fighters failed to front the media for the simple reason that they were in a Las Vegas hospital.
Jędrzejczyk, in particular, copped tremendous damage to her face and forehead, which was incredibly swollen afterwards as the entire T-Mobile crowd rose to its feet in applause.
The main event though?
“It sucked,” White conceded.
“I expected Yoel Romero to … I’m shocked. He knew this was his last chance at a world title opportunity, I thought he would come out like a bat out of hell.
“He didn’t. Right from the bell he came out there with his hands up. Made no sense whatsoever."
Adesanya doubled down when he fronted the media, saying: “It takes two to tango.
“I can’t force a guy to fight ... I might as well have used a training dummy at my gym. You guys know me, I’m never in a boring fight.
“(But) I need people to try and take this shit from me.
“Even in the fifth round, he didn't attack. Show me you want that belt.”
Romero, however, blamed the champ for the lacklustre headliner saying “I can’t fight a ghost”.
The Cuban also got up and danced when asked if Adesanya had hurt his leg with repeated kicks, before then paying tribute to Whittaker who suffered significant damage in their two epic UFC wars: “(But) he would stand and fight with me”.
Originally published as Israel Adesanya wins Yoel Romero fight by unanimous decision at UFC 248