When Dricus du Plessis reacted to Sean Strickland claiming Alex Pereira despised him: "I have enough friends already"

Earlier this year, Dricus du Plessis addressed Sean Strickland claiming that Alex Pereira disliked him. The South African fighter dismissed feeling bad about it and gave Pereira his flowers as "one of the greatest combat athletes" ever.

For context, du Plessis and Strickland were set to fight in a high-stakes title rematch at UFC 312 in Sydney in January. During a pre-fight interview, Strickland revealed that Pereira would be in his corner again. The Brazilian notably cornered 'Tarzan' for his first fight against du Plessis at UFC 297 in January 2024.

During the interview, Strickland claimed that Pereira despised du Plessis for "some reason" and that could be why 'Poatan' wanted to corner him. He said:

"I think Alex is an angry motherf**er. For some reason he hates Dricus. I don’t know what you did to him, but he f***ing hates you, dude... He just has that hate in his heart."

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It appears Strickland's claims didn't faze du Plessis, and the South African fighter took it in his stride. In an interview with AgFight, 'Stillknocks' responded to Strickland's claims and said:

"[Pereira] was also in the corner in the last fight. And that doesn’t make any difference to me. And the same applies to this one. I don’t think he hates me. If he does, I don’t know why. Sometimes you see a person and you just don’t like them, maybe that’s it. Maybe he doesn’t like my face, or my attitude, I don’t know. But I don’t think he hates me."

He continued:

"We’ve never even spoken. I asked him for a picture, I think, once. I consider Alex an incredible fighter, one of the greatest that ever walked the planet Earth, one of the greatest combat athletes in history. But if he hates me, I don’t care. I have enough friends already." [H/t: AgFight]

Intriguingly, Pereira has thrown shade at du Plessis in the past and has accused the South African of ducking a fight against him.

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Ali Abdelaziz predicts upcoming Dricus du Plessis vs. Khamzat Chimaev fight

Ali Abdelaziz recently shared his thoughts on the Dricus du Plessis vs. Khamzat Chimaev fight and issued a bold prediction. The two will fight in a middleweight title fight at UFC 319 next month.

Speaking on the Pound 4 Pound podcast, Abdelaziz called the fight strongly in favor of Chimaev and said:

"It's hard to bet against a focused and healthy Khamzat. I think he can beat anyone on any given day. As talent, as technique, it's Khamzat. If you go to the third, fourth or fifth rounds, how this fight is going to go? I believe Khamzat can go there, do to him what he did to Robert Whittaker. 100% I believe this."

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Edited by Nishant Zende.