Israel Adesanya is rather amused by Paulo Costa’s latest excuse for his loss at UFC 253.
Costa (13-1 MMA, 5-1 UFC), who came up short in his bid to take Adesanya’s (20-0 MMA, 9-0 UFC) middleweight title with a second-round TKO defeat in September, told recently revealed in a YouTube video that he drank wine the night before stepping into the octagon to help him sleep.
That decision ultimately backfired, Costa said, because he went into the fight “hungover” and claims he struggled from both the drinking and a lack of proper sleep. Adesanya found that to be quite comical, he told MMA Junkie on Monday.
“That’s just funny,” Adesanya told MMA Junkie. “There’s certain things I’ve done before some of my fights in the past where I learnt my mistakes, but I went in and got my job done. Some people aren’t cut out for that lifestyle.”
For his part, Adesanya says he was somewhat puzzled as to why Costa would come out and make that statement now, after more than five months has passed since the fight.
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Costa has pushed hard for a rematch in the aftermath of UFC 253. The Brazilian said he would “kill” Adesanya if they ran it back and is not happy with how the champion has rubbed the result in his face since the heated fight.
Adesanya said that attitude is not going to be beneficial to Costa’s career. “The Eraser” is currently booked to fight Robert Whittaker in the main event of UFC Fight Night on April 17, and a win would put him right back in the conversation for another title shot.
If he wants a second fight to be any different, though, Adesanya said Costa needs to correct himself both mentally and physically.
“I’ll tell you one thing: The best thing to do in his position is accept the fact he lost,” Adesanya said. “He got his ass whooped. The fact that he keeps trying to make all these excuses, it’s only going to do him worse in the long run. He’s making excuses because his ego can’t handle the fact that ‘The Skinny Clown’ whooped his ass badly then double-tapped him twice.
“Just swallow your ego. You got your ass whooped. Get back to the drawing board and reassess your whole game. You can’t just rest on that because if you do – this is my advice – you’ll never get far in life, or in this game.”
Whether or not a rematch lies in the future remains to be seen. For now, though, Adesanya’s focus is on something bigger than Costa.
“The Last Stylebender” will attempt to add the light heavyweight title to his resume alongside the middleweight belt when he challenges Jan Blachowicz (27-8 MMA, 10-5 UFC) in the main event of UFC 259, which takes place Saturday at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas and airs on pay-per-view following prelims on ESPN and early prelims on ESPN+.
