Two championship fights and a splashy bout in one of many Ultimate Fighting Championship’s deepest divisions spotlight U.F.C. 281 on Saturday evening at Madison Square Garden.
Israel Adesanya, the U.F.C.’s middleweight champion, will try to defend his belt for the seventh time in opposition to Alex Pereira, a rising blended martial arts contender who defeated Adesanya twice in the sooner phases of their careers in kickboxing fights. Adesanya, who joined the U.F.C. in 2018, holds an undefeated report in the 185-pound middleweight division and has misplaced solely as soon as in blended martial arts, when he challenged for the 205-pound mild heavyweight belt in March 2021. But regardless of his dominant current performances, Adesanya has turn out to be a polarizing determine amongst U.F.C. followers for not knocking out an opponent since 2020.
In the co-main occasion, Carla Esparza, the ladies’s strawweight champion, will face Zhang Weili, who can be a former champion and misplaced the belt final April through knockout to Rose Namajunas.
Esparza, the inaugural 115-pound champion in 2014, defeated Namajunas in a break up determination in March, however has been booed and criticized this week for that struggle’s lack of motion. Fans have been extra supportive of Zhang, the U.F.C.’s first Chinese-born champion.
Before the title fights, Dustin Poirier, a U.F.C. veteran and former interim champion, will face Michael Chandler in a bout carrying significance atop the lads’s light-weight division. Poirier, who joined the U.F.C. in 2011, rose to fame after finishing a trilogy of fights in opposition to the star Conor McGregor.
Chandler, a former champion in Bellator, one other promotional firm, joined the U.F.C. in 2021. He rapidly turned a fan favourite after thrilling fights in opposition to the previous champion Charles Oliveira, Justin Gaethje and Tony Ferguson, whom Chandler knocked out with a vicious entrance kick in May.
Both fighters are ranked inside the prime 5 of the division, and the winner will doubtless earn a title shot or a struggle in opposition to Oliveira, the now-No. 1 contender who misplaced the belt final month to Islam Makhachev.
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