Israel Adesanya will challenge Jan Blachowicz for light heavyweight title

Israel Adesanya next’s fight will give him the opportunity to pull off a rare feat as he’ll look to capture championships in two different weight classes.

Last night follow UFC Vegas 12, UFC president Dana White told reporters that Adesanya will fight newly crowded light heavyweight champion Jan Blachowicz in his next fight.

White clams the reason why he’s letting Adesanya fight for the 205 pound title is because of former UFC middleweight champion and current No. 1 contender Robert Whittaker doesn’t sound interested in rematching Adesanya for the middleweight strap.

“Listen, when the fight was over on ‘Fight Island,’ the last fight (at UFC 254), I was like, ‘I’m going to have to sit down with this kid (Adesanya) and convince him on why he needs to fight Whittaker,’” White said in his post-fight press conference. “Whittaker comes out and says he doesn’t want to fight him – craziest (expletive) I’ve ever seen. Yeah, there’s no arguing with Israel now. I thought Whittaker deserved the shot and Whittaker doesn’t want it, so yeah, we’ll let him do it.”

Adesanya (20-0) and Blachowicz (26-8) bought fought on the same card at UFC 253 in September. At the event, Adesanya defeated Paulo Costa by a second round TKO in the main event. In the co-main event, Blachowicz won the vacant light heavyweight championship with a TKO victory over Dominick Reyes.