Former UFC rivals Israel Adesanya and Jon Jones bury hatchet after bitter feud

06 July 2023 , 12:26

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Former UFC rivals Israel Adesanya and Jon Jones bury hatchet after bitter feud

Former UFC rivals Israel Adesanya and Jon Jones appear to have patched up their differences after years of back-and-forth.

When Jones, who is now heavyweight champion, held the gold at light-heavyweight, it seemed that the duo were on a collision course with Adesanya likely to move up to challenge for the 205lb belt. At the time, both men were seemingly unbeatable and despite the New Zealand native losing twice, he has come back and reclaimed his spot atop the 185lb division.

But when it became clear Jones was moving up and leaving his days at light-heavyweight in the past, the feud appeared to die down as the pair focused on other opponents. And in a video posted to Meta's brand new social media platform Threads, Adesanya showed himself shaking hands and joking around with his rival.

Adesanya can be seen joking about his previous burying of the hatchet with Alex Pereira after their four-fight rivalry, saying: "Well, f***ing well. First Alex [Pereira] and now this motherf***er Jones. What you doing?" When Jones smiles and grabs him by the shoulders, he jokingly says "hey, hey, hey, chill champ. Bless up king."

The video shows Jones, who recently went head-to-head with lineal champion Francis Ngannou at a PFL event, smiling and joking around with Adesanya. He doesn't speak much, asking "what's up" and telling his former rival that he has "blessings" and calling him "king".

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Israel Adesanya ran into Jon Jones (INTERENET PICTURE)

And Jones appeared happy to see him (INTERENET PICTURE)

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It's a far cry from just a month ago, when Adesanya declared that he did not get on with Jones and insisted their story was "not over". “It’s not at odds,” Adesanya told The MMA Hour. “I’ve never had a conversation with this guy ever, so how am I going to have a friendship, like a ‘buddy-dom’ with someone I’ve never talked to?

"Yeah, we’ve beefed, I don’t like him, he doesn’t like me, but we respect each other’s skills and I was a fan before I was even in the UFC. He was the youngest UFC champion, did great things, I followed his career, then he called me out and I was like, ‘The f***? What did I do to you?’ Same thing, I went back at him, we went back for a little bit on Twitter, which was fun, but the story’s not over.”

Adesanya is expected to defend his title later this year, while Jones will likely face Stipe Miocic or Sergei Pavlovich for the heavyweight title. He has recently been feuding with boxing champion Tyson Fury but it appears that Ngannou may end up getting that major crossover fight instead.

Donagh Corby