SYDNEY – Eric Nicksick says Sean Strickland needs to have a perfect night to dethrone Israel Adesanya.
Strickland (27-5 MMA, 14-5 UFC) challenges champion Adesanya (24-2 MMA, 13-2 UFC) for the middleweight title in Saturday’s UFC 293 pay-per-view headliner at Qudos Bank Arena, which follows prelims on ESPNews/ESPN+ and early prelims on ESPN+.
Strickland is a big underdog, and Nicksick, his head coach, isn’t too surprised. He rates Adesanya highly and knows Strickland can’t slip up at any point in the fight if he wants to become champion.
“We have a game plan that we have to go out and execute,” Nicksick told MMA Junkie on Tuesday. “We need everything to go right, and we need some things to go wrong on his end. Let’s be clear: We have to understand that, in my opinion, this is the best middleweight to ever do it. We have to go out there and execute this thing correctly, and if we can do that, I think we go home with the ‘W.’”
Strickland wasn’t Adesanya’s original opponent. Adesanya was meant to face No. 1 contender Dricus Du Plessis, but after Du Plessis was unable to make a quick turnaround from UFC 290 in July, Strickland was called for the opportunity – and Nicksick says he’s not taking it for granted.
“He’s very cognizant of it,” Nicksick said. “Now is probably the most real – Sean’s always real, but I would almost say kind of vulnerable in a sense where he said to me, ‘Hey man, I don’t know when I’ll ever have this opportunity again.’ So, he understands the gravity of what’s in front of him, and he’s taking it very serious, and he understands the matchup that he has in front of us. I think everything up to our preparation, he’s really taken seriously.”
The short-notice call was no issue for Strickland. Nicksick says he’s always training.
“It’s easy because he lives in the gym no matter what,” Nicksick said. “So, even if he had a fight on the books or not, he was going to be in the gym no matter what. And that’s what I kind of alluded to after Dricus beat Whittaker. Right then he was like, ‘Oh well, now I don’t what now.’
“I was like, ‘Hey listen, there’s a good chance you might even be the backup if Dricus fights Izzy.’ So, it wasn’t long thereafter when Izzy called his name, and fortunately he’s been training and it allowed us to keep a leg up on the situation.”
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 293.
