Israel Mobolaji Odunayo Oluwafemi Temitayo Owolabi Adesanya is a Nigerian-New Zealander professional mixed martial artist, kickboxer, and former boxer with multiple championships in all three disciplines.
As a mixed martial artist, he currently competes in the Middleweight division in the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), where he is the former UFC Middleweight Champion. In kickboxing, he is a former Glory Middleweight Championship title, challenger.
Adesanya made his professional debut in 2012, with a TKO win against James Griffiths. He scored another TKO win against John Vake, before taking a two-year hiatus from mixed martial arts.
In December 2017, it was announced that Adesanya had signed a contract with the UFC. He made his debut against Rob Wilkinson on 11 February 2018, at UFC 221.[53] He won the fight via technical knockout in the second round.
Adesanya is widely regarded as one of the best strikers in mixed martial arts, both offensively and defensively. As of 23 August 2022, he is #2 in the UFC men’s pound-for-pound rankings.
Israel Adesanya Siblings: How many siblings does Israel Adesanya have?
Israel Mobolaji Adesanya was born on the 22nd day of July 1989 in Lagos, Nigeria. He is the eldest of 5 children born to his mother, Taiwo Adesanya (a nurse) and to his father, Femi Adesanya (an accountant).
Adesanya has 5 siblings, of whom little is known about other than the fact they work as accountants or nurses.
They include 28-year-old Deborah (nurse) 26-year-old Samuel (nurse), 26-year-old David (accountant), and 20-year-old Bolu (student).
At the age of 21, Adesanya moved to Auckland, New Zealand, and began training in mixed martial arts under Eugene Bareman at City Kickboxing, with future UFC fighters such as Dan Hooker, Kai Kara-France and current UFC Featherweight Champion Alexander Volkanovski.
He trains in wrestling under the Romanian New Zealander Andrei Păuleț. Adesanya is multilingual. He is fluent in Yoruba, Nigerian Pidgin and English.