Aleksandar Rakic says he has ‘unfinished business’ with Jan Blachowicz

LONDON – Aleksandar Rakic is eager to operate issues back with Jan Blachowicz.

Rakic tore his ACL in the 3rd round versus Blachowicz at UFC on ESPN 36 in May, resulting in a TKO gain for the former mild heavyweight champion. Rakic was forced to undertake knee medical procedures just a week soon after the struggle to restore his knee, which he currently hurt for the duration of schooling camp.

Due to the regrettable ending of the combat, Rakic (14-3 MMA, 6-2 UFC) thinks it’s only ideal that the pair rematch.

“Of program Jan is seeking for that title fight, but occur on,” Rakic informed MMA Junkie. “We have to be honest, he just can’t be joyful with that get. He did not defeat me for the reason that he was the superior male that night, he beat me simply because I conquer myself. I injured myself so yeah now he’s chatting he wants to go to middleweight to fight Adesanya, then he claimed he would welcome Usman to 205.

“Doesn’t make really feeling, but I waited on him when he was injured, so let us be a gentleman and wait around for me and let us complete this organization since this is unfinished small business. He’s a accurate warrior, correct athlete, I respect him, but this is unfinished business enterprise and I know I can defeat him, and if this did not happen that night, my knee did not pop out, I would be No. 1 contender and going to battle for the belt next.”

The struggle was tied at one-spherical-a-piece, with Blachowicz (29-9 MMA, 12-6 UFC) winning Spherical 1 and Rakic winning Spherical 2. Rakic thinks that he was in the method of taking more than the battle.

“I trained truly tough for that a person, specially the cardio base because we understood it was gonna be my to start with five-spherical battle, and I know that I have better conditioning than Jan,” Rakic explained. “The approach was to decide him apart. Just after the next spherical to see how things had been going, to function on the takedowns, to get him weary, and then to combine points up in the stand up.

“Because I felt previously commencing of the 3rd spherical he was already a tiny little bit slower, he was breathing large, and if you rewatch the fight, my fingers ended up more quickly than in the 1st round. So it took me a while to put the heartbeat up, but the strategy was to place the fight as prolonged as feasible, to drag him to the deep waters and acquire by force and then maybe TKO or submission.”