Dana White Confirms Israel Adesanya's Next Title Defence

Dana White has confirmed that Israel Adesanya's night fight is all good to go, it's just that Fight Island is taking priority and he'll announce the middleweight title fight 'when it's time.'

Adesanya was meant to defend his UFC title against Paulo Costa in March but the challenger was still recovering from surgery, so instead the New Zealander took on Yoel Romero, in a strange fight.

Now the Last Stylebender is awaiting his next fight and asked, about whether Costa would be next for the middleweight champion, UFC president White had a perfectly reasonable explanation about why nothing has been confirmed yet.

"There's no hold up [to the Costa fight] we just haven't done it yet. There's no hold up," White said at his latest press conference in Abu Dhabi ahead of Wednesday night's 'Fight Night.'

"We're focused on Fight Island, I'm not thinking about anything other than this right now. We have fights laid out until October, our schedules already made, we're way ahead of this thing. When it's time, we'll announce it."

However, there has been some conflicting reports about the Costa fight, with the Brazilian's manager claiming just last week that Adesanya's people had lied about not getting a contract.

"His [Adesanya's] coach lied," Wallid Ismail told MMA Fighting, "He has to understand that when he says something in Australia we can see it right away in Brazil through the Internet. He can't lie. There was an offer for July 11, and then they said August, and now they are talking September or October."

Adesanya defeated Romero in March at UFC 248. Image: PA Images

UFC decamped to the middle east ahead of last weekend's UFC 251 event,headlined by Kamaru Usman vs Jorge Masvidal, and are holding three more shows at the Flash Forum before they head back to America.

They have already announced the fights for UFC 252, which is headlined by Stipe Miocic vs Daniel Cormier III, although no location has been confirmed yet.

Justin Gaethje's lightweight title fight against Khabib Nurmagomedov has also been confirmed for later this year, but following the death of Khabib's father there's not going to be any rush to confirm the date for that fight.

White wants to get on with Fight Island shows before announcing Adesanya's next title defence. Image: PA Images

Hopefully Adesanya vs Costa will be sorted soon, with the two men undefeated and having beaten Romero in their most recent fights.

Who do you think will win? Let us know in the comments.

Subscribe to Fight Pass, where you'll get access to every UFC fight ever, plus behind the scenes exclusives and original content that can't be found anywhere else.

Topics: Fight Island, UFC News, MMA News, UFC 251, UFC, MMA, Dana White, Israel Adesanya, UFC 252

Ryan Sidle

Ryan is a writer for SPORTbible. He covers all sport from football, formula one, cricket, rugby, tennis, athletics, mma and wrestling. He obviously hates YOUR football team and has no interest in synchronised swimming.

@Sidler28