Israel Adesanya Suspicious Of Paulo Costa’s Surgery

UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya is not buying the news that Paulo Costa will be on the sidelines because of a surgery.

Adesanya became the middleweight king following his knockout of Robert Whittaker at UFC 243 last month. He was then expected to defend his title against fellow unbeaten star Paulo Costa who was in attendance.

However, UFC president Dana White recently revealed that “The Eraser” would be out for eight months after undergoing bicep surgery, putting a wrench in those plans. And for Adesanya’s part, he thinks something else is at play:

“No, that’s why after seeing Icarus, I don’t believe anything anyone says,” Adesanya said on Ariel Helwani’s MMA Show on Monday when asked if he believed the news. “I think allegedly is the word I’m going to use right now. My legal team’s with me right now working.

“I have my own suspicions. The UFC have moved shows from New York to LA before. They’ve kept information. The new USADA policy is you can’t disclose anything after the trial, things happen.”

Despite his suspicions, “The Last Stylebender” still has Costa on his radar. It’s even more so the case considering many people believe the Brazilian has a chance at beating him:

“I’d like to get that one out of the way because he’s another guy that everyone thinks is dangerous and I think he’s a dangerous guy,” he added. “Beat a lot of good names in the sport. He beat Yoel in his last fight. He scraped, I didn’t think it was as dominant as it should have been.

“I just want to beat everyone up in my division that’s supposed to be the bad motherf*cker. Yeah, I want to clean out the division and he’s one of them.”

For now, it looks like Romero could be Adesanya’s next opponent — another fighter many believe could beat him.

What do you think of Adesanya’s suspicions?