It took a certain amount of hostility for former UFC champion Daniel Cormier to view this weekend’s main event as a fight worth getting excited about.
Middleweight champion Dricus du Plessis will put his title on the line for the first time in the main event of the UFC 305 pay-per-view and will be tasked with thwarting Israel Adesanya’s ambitions for a third championship.
The pair are set to step into the cage at the RAC Arena in Perth, Australia, marking the culmination of a feud that erupted more than a year ago due to controversial comments made by the then-future titleholder.
In post-fight interviews during his early days at UFC, “Stillnox” referred to himself as the UFC’s “real” fighter due to his continued presence on the African continent, and he reiterated that sentiment in his pursuit of a gold medal, vowing to become the first champion to be born, live and train in Africa.
The comments led to a tense exchange with Adesanya, who had just criticized his opponent’s “colonialist mindset” earlier in UFC 305 fight week.
With that in mind, the sensitive nature of their hatred shows no signs of abating as fight night approaches, and one former champion doesn’t see that as a bad thing…
Cormier: “I want to see the fight because of the du Plessis-Adesanya feud”
During a recent episode of “Good Guy/Bad Guy” with Chael Sonnen on the ESPN MMA YouTube channel, Cormier offered his outlook for this weekend’s PPV headline in Australia.
There has been animosity between the two since Adesanya took issue with du Plessis’ words, but Cormier suggested that despite the ill will being “unpleasant”, interest in the bout has gone from zero to 100.
“I don’t want to say the wrong thing because it’s easy to offend people on both sides,” Cormier said. “When he (du Plessis) said it, I thought he would take it back because of Usman, Ngannou and Izzy. He won’t take it back. He remains committed to his belief that he is the one true champion of Africa. I don’t know if I agree with that but… for me, more important than all of that is I want to see the fight.
“Chael, if you had told me before all this happened — that it was going to be so heated and so nasty — I can tell you I really wasn’t that interested in seeing those two fight,” Cormier continued. “But now, Chael, I’m really interested in seeing those two fight because there’s something about it. I love fights between great fighters, but when there’s a little something extra in there, that’s what draws me in as a fan. … You’ve got two of the best middleweights in the world fighting this weekend, but there’s also a hatred between them, and that’s what makes it interesting.”
Du Plessis and Adesanya will finally get the chance to settle scores inside the steel walls of the cage this weekend, 13 months after their explosive showdown during International Fight Week.