UFC gentle heavyweight champion Alex Pereira wasn’t going to overlook out on a giant alternative.
Pereira (10-2 MMA, 7-1 UFC) will run issues again with Jiri Prochazka (30-4-1 MMA, 4-1 UFC) in Saturday’s UFC 303 (pay-per-view, ESPN, ESPN+) important occasion at T-Cell Area in Las Vegas.
Pereira received the decision lower than two weeks in the past after the unique headliner between Conor McGregor and Michael Chandler fell aside. He’ll make a two-month turnaround after knocking out Jamahal Hill at UFC 300 in April – one other important occasion that got here collectively for him on quick discover.
“I like taking these alternatives,” Pereria instructed The MacLife via an interpreter. “I’m going to be 37. I don’t understand how for much longer I’m going to be combating. It’s alternative for me to maintain myself lively, to maintain myself coaching. I’m all the time coaching, so these alternatives, you’ve simply received to take them every time they arrive.”
Pereira’s determination to just accept the battle on quick discover was additionally facilitated by his opponent, Prochazka, whom he was already anticipating to battle.
“It’s laborious to say if I’d settle for the battle in opposition to another person, however on this case it’s Jiri,” Pereira stated. “It’s not essentially the truth that I’ve fought him earlier than and beat him earlier than, however the truth that we knew we had been imagined to be combating quickly.
“We didn’t anticipate it to be this quickly, however we had been already anticipating to battle one another, so I really feel like we’re nearly across the identical timing. If we had been to battle in August, that is after we would begin selecting up coaching.”
Pereira knocked out Prochazka to assert the vacant gentle heavyweight title this previous November at UFC 295. He doesn’t anticipate a special model of Prochazka once they run issues again.
“I don’t assume he would have modified that a lot. It hasn’t been that lengthy,” Pereira stated of Prochazka. “I used to be simply watching his final battle yesterday, and clearly you possibly can’t evaluate as a result of it’s a special battle, however I don’t assume he was capable of change that a lot since our final battle. If there’s one factor I might possibly change, it’s my takedown protection.”
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