UFC 276 as it happened: Volkanovski and Adesanya retain titles

That’s all she wrote for UFC 276 in Las Vegas.

The road to the middleweight title still goes through New Zealand, but the next man to set foot on that road may just be Israel Adesanya’s toughest task given Alex Pereira has vanquished the Nigerian-born Kiwi twice in a kickboxing ring.

And as for the road to the featherweight title? That still goes through Windang. Soon enough, that might be home of the lightweight crown too, because Australia’s Alex Volkanovski may just be the UFC’s pound for pound king.

Thanks for joining us in the octagon. Until next time, keep it real.

The UFC is targeting a return to Australia in the first third of next year with an event that could shatter the biggest crowd figure in the promotion’s history.

So now the question becomes: who headlines the show?

Alex Volkanovski is an early favourite after dominating Max Holloway to retain his featherweight crown. Imagine the scenes if the Australian fights for the lightweight strap on home soil.

Then there is Israel Adesanya, who can already lay claim to headlining the event which drew the biggest crowd in UFC history, which came in Melbourne in 2019.

How about Tai Tuivasa, who is rising up the heavyweight rankings and could soon find himself on the cusp of a title shot should his remarkable knockout run continue.

Regardless, across the Tasman we’ve got the cattle to fill a stadium.

Israel Adesanya knows who comes next.

Alex Pereira arrived in Las Vegas unranked but is set to get a shot at Adesanya’s crown having already beaten him twice in kickboxing.

“We know who is next. Trust me, the first time I told you, it was an error on my part [by] spamming the right hand,” Adesanya says of the night Pereira beat him in kickboxing.

“But that was kickboxing. It’s easy to knockout, what’s the hillbilly’s name [Sean Strickland], because he was parrying the jabs.

“Like I said at the press conference, next time I put you on skates, you’re going to get frozen like Elsa. I’ll leave it at that.”

The road to the middleweight title still goes through New Zealand.

Cannonier had to push the pace in a bid to pry the middleweight championship away from Adesanya. It got to the point where he had to be reckless if he was going to walk away as the new champion, or lose by decision. Adesanya told us he was going to make it look easy and he was content to get through the final round knowing he had done enough to take a lead on the cards. Adesanya pushes the pace late and should retain his title.

Adesanya 49-46 Cannonier

Cannonier has to push the pace, otherwise Adesanya will be able to avoid taking too much damage and pick him off in the process. Cannonier’s corner tells him he is down three rounds to one and he needs to pull it out of the fire here.

Adesanya 39-37 Cannonier