Israel Adesanya vs. Marvin Vettori was everything fight fans had hoped to see from the best the middleweight division has to offer.
The showdown served as the main event of the UFC 263 pay-per-view event on Saturday night (June 13, 2021) from Glendale, Arizona from Gila River Arena.
As seen in the fight, the first round opened with Marvin catching a leg kick and got a takedown into full guard. Adesanya scrambled back to his feet. The second round showed Vettori throwing sweeping shots and mostly missing while Adesanya was keeping things simple and landed at will by doing so.
Fast forward to the third round, Vettori dragged him down to the ground and got his back so he could try for a rear-naked choke, but Adesanya put a stop to that by scrambling. The leg kicks were paying off for Adesanya and even dropped him in the third round with it.
Vettori did get a takedown in the fourth round, but Adesanya managed to get back to his feet. Vettori tried to go back to the takedowns in the fifth round, but Adesanya put up solid defense. In the end, it was Izzy who walked away with the win to retain his title.
Vettori had gone 5-1-1 in his last seven fights heading into this bout while Izzy was coming off a decision loss to light heavyweight champion Jan Blachowicz at UFC 259.
Let’s see how the fighters reacted to the outcome of this fight:
