Nigerian-born New Zealand professional mixed martial artist Israel Adesanya has blasted popular Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) promoter Ali Abdelaziz.
Ali Abdelaziz is the manager of Nigerian-American professional mixed martial artist Kamarudeen Usman.
Adesanya is the reigning UFC middleweight champion while Usman is the reigning welterweight champion.
According to Adesanya, Abdelaziz's insistence on making a fight with Usman is bigger than both fighters.
Adesanya and Usman are two fighters born in Nigeria who are now UFC Champions.
They have defeated most of the fighters in their division and many expect Usman to move up in class to fight Adesanya.
Abdelaziz publicly stated that Usman should move up to 185 pounds to Adesanya.
Adesanya has now responded in a statement calling Abdelaziz a peanut head. In a studio appearance on The MMA Hour Adesanya said, “It bothered Eugene [Bareman] as well, and it bothered me.
“I’m like, what the f*ck is this peanut head talking about? Because I’ve gone on record saying I don’t want this fight.
"We don’t want this fight, because it’s bigger than us. I understand where he’s coming from, don’t get me wrong. I understand where he’s coming from.
"But you can make tens of millions other ways. There’s so many other fights you can make. But he said he’s being selfish — I’m like, fair enough. And also, he just needs to give his fighters their phone back, like Kamaru has said, because sometimes he gets on there and starts to talk all this rubbish.
Adesanya then went on to explain that the fight with Usman does not need to happen.
He added, “This fight is not just going to happen just because, ‘Oh, it needs to happen, we need to see it.’ Nah, it’s bigger than us. The great nation of Africa, we’ve got three people who are champions right now and defending and ruling their divisions with iron black fists. This is legendary.
"They’re going to talk about this in history. Not sports history, they’re going to talk about this in sports history and just history in general. So why try and [ruin it]? We’re going to divide and conquer. So, Kamaru is his own person, Kamaru tells him when to f*ck off too.
“When I see Ali, he’s going to be cordial, he’s going to be nice. He’s never [not], there’s no static. He’s just doing his job. But that? Eugene knows how we feel about that.
“The way peanut head did it was just disgusting, and Eugene kind of expressed how we do it in our gym and the code that we have. And like I said, me and Kamaru definitely feel the same way. What’s the point? This is bigger than us. Kids are going to look at us generations from now and be like, ‘Those guys from Nigeria, they did that. They ruled. They ruled this whole thing until they left, and the left on top.’ Same with Francis as well.
"So yeah, I don’t know why he [did that]. And he always comes up to me, ‘Oh, my brother. My African brother,’ this and that. So I’m like, why? If you’re supposed to be a ‘brother, brother,’ why are you trying to be selfish now and look at the dollar signs?”
Adesanya recently defeated Robert Whittaker at UFC 271 while Usman is expected to take to the octagon later in the year.