UFC middleweight champion Dricus du Plessis has all of the respect on this planet for mild heavyweight champ Alex Pereira, but when the UFC have been to ebook a matchup between the 2 titleholders, du Plessis can see an actual world the place he stops Pereira with strikes.
“If I’m speaking about simply the standup exchanges—I’m not combating a kickboxing struggle, I’m combating an MMA struggle,” du Plessis instructed Submission Radio. “And in a kickboxing struggle, You want to have the ability to land combos, it’s essential to land large punches the entire time, get a man rocked, you get an eight rely, you could have all these variables. The place in MMA, I don’t care who you’re. If I catch you clear with these small gloves, you’re going to go down and I’m going to catch you finally.”
Du Plessis captured the middleweight title with a choice win over Sean Strickland at UFC 297 this previous January, after which stopped Israel Adesanya in his first title protection at UFC 305 the next August. At mild heavyweight, Pereira has put collectively a Fighter of the 12 months marketing campaign with knockout wins over Jamahal Hill, Jiri Prochazka, and Khalil Rountree.
The South African champion understands he has his work lower out for him, however after watching Pereira’s win over Rountree, du Plessis noticed some issues he might capitalize on.
“Now, I mentioned it with with Izzy—he mentioned, I’m too gradual, I wouldn’t have the ability to catch him. Properly, yeah,” du Plessis mentioned. “I made a put up just lately saying possibly it’s not fairly, however rattling, it’s efficient as a result of I’ll catch you finally. After which it’s then it’s a complete totally different story as a result of I’m not partaking in a kickboxing struggle. I’m punching and I’m kicking, nevertheless it’s not a kickboxing struggle. It’s an MMA struggle, and once I put these collectively, it’s a distinct struggle.
“So I truthfully consider that with a man like Alex Pereira, he has energy. I’ve a number of energy too. The person is… yeah [he has] crisp putting. His putting is unbelievable. That’s why he has the kickboxing résumé. … However we noticed with [the] Khalil Rountree struggle, we noticed a number of issues that [Rountree had] a number of success [with] in these first two rounds. He actually did.”
Watch du Plessis’ interview with Submission Radio under.
