Alex Pereira showed something Jiri Prochazka had been waiting for at UFC 320… ‘Finally’

Jiri Prochazka finally saw ’emotion’ from Alex Pereira at UFC 320

Prochazka finished Khalil Rountree Jr. at UFC 320 to record a key victory of his own at Las Vegas’ T-Mobile Arena earlier this month. After that result, ‘BJP’ has aspirations of a third shot at getting the better of Pereira.

With that in mind, the ex-champ paid close attention to ‘Poatan’ in his main event rematch with Ankalaev. And while speaking to Kamaru Usman and Henry Cejudo on their Pound 4 Pound podcast, Prochazka divulged his takeaway.

“When I watched their fight, I just saw how big is the difference between their first fight,” Prochazka said.

“I saw that Alex, he just wanted to win, totally wanted to win. And after a long time, I saw him really going mad and (being) angry. Finally, he showed emotion in the fight.

“This is something he’s not doing normally in the fights,” he continued. “He is totally every time controlled. Finally he showed all these emotions.

“Maybe (it was) the anger. But he showed the emotion, how to go through. This is exactly what I like my opponent (to be).”

Jiri Prochazka planned to confront Magomed Ankalaev

The result of the UFC 320 main event was no doubt satisfying for Pereira given the barrage of trash talk he had come under from Ankalaev. But ‘Poatan’ might not have been the only big name happy to see how things played out.

The now-former champion also took aim at Prochazka in the months before the recent PPV, and ‘BJP’ did not forget. In fact, during an interview on The Ariel Helwani Show following UFC 320, Prochazka revealed he wanted to confront Ankalaev but was prevented from doing so by his coach.

“Before this fight (against Rountree), I was prepared to go for his manager (Abdelaziz) or Ankalaev and tell him, ‘What the f— was this s—? Why? Why you did that? I didn’t attack you with anything, so why you spoke these bulls—?’

“My coach told me, ‘Jiri, calm down. Our fight is Khalil Rountree right now. Let’s be focused for this one. Don’t be focused on anybody else.’

“I just kept that, yeah. And I’m happy I did that. I don’t like to be focused on anybody else before a fight,” Prochazka added.