Dricus Du
Plessis knew the scorecards were going to be close, but he was
confident he did enough get the nod against Sean
Strickland in the UFC 297
headliner.
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“It was a close fight, make no mistake – but I thought I had it.
When that split decision came, I thought, ‘This is, 100 percent,
50-50.’ When they said ‘And new …,’ it felt like 15 years of work
and sacrifice together in one single sentence. It feels surreal.
It’s amazing,” Du Plessis said at Saturday’s post-fight press
conference.
“I thought I did enough to win the fight. It definitely was a close
fight. He won the first round and I made the necessary adjustments.
… At the end of the day, I went toe-to-toe with the self-proclaimed
best boxer in the UFC.”
Strickland got off to a strong start behind his jab, but Du Plessis
got better as the fight progressed, mixing in takedowns with his
striking to keep his opponent off balance. Ultimately, that was
enough for the South African to win a closely-contested split
decision, though many observers thought Strickland deserved to
retain his title.
Despite the close nature of the fight, UFC CEO Dana White didn’t
appear to be interested in booking an immediate rematch.
“Eventually, these two are going to end up fighting again, I’m
sure,” White said. “But we’re not thinking about an immediate
rematch right now.”
Du Plessis, meanwhile, has turned his attention to Israel
Adesanya. The two were building animosity in the second half of
2023 — especially after Du Plessis referred to himself as the UFC’s
“real” African champ — but when “Stillknocks” was unable to compete
at UFC 293, Strickland stepped in and upset “The Last Stylebender.”
With Adesanya hinting at a return at some point this year, Du
Plessis sees the fight as an ideal next move.
“It’s nothing personal,” Du Plessis said. “It’s not personal at
all. That’s just the fight the fans want to see. I want to fight
the best competition. There’s a lot of guys I’m going to be
fighting, but the fans want to see Israel
Adesanya vs. Dricus Du
Plessis. There’s a lot of hype that was already built on
it.
“If the fans, there’s some way they start backtracking and the fans
don’t really want to see Adesanya, we don’t do that fight. It’s
fine to me. I don’t care who it is. But that’s just the fight on
top of my head that I think the people want to see and would get a
lot of people excited.”