Israel Adesanya will be making the first title defense of his second reign with the middleweight championship when he faces Sean Strickland in the main event of UFC 293 on Saturday in Sydney.
The main card at Qudos Bank Arena will be on ESPN+ pay-per-view starting at 10 p.m. ET, with prelims on ESPN News and ESPN+ at 8 p.m. and early prelims on ESPN+ at 6:30 p.m.
Adesanya (24-2) regained the 185-pound title in April with a second-round knockout of Alex Pereira, who had dethroned him five months earlier. Adesanya is No. 4 in the ESPN pound-for-pound men's rankings.
Strickland (27-5) has won two fights in a row and eight of his last 10. He is No. 8 in the ESPN middleweight rankings.
What are the storylines behind the top fights at UFC 293 -- including a heavyweight scrap featuring the King of the Shoey, Tai Tuivasa? How are experts breaking them down? What do the fighters have to say? Here is the fight card, how to watch it and a collection of all of the UFC 293 essentials.
UFC 293 fight card
ESPN+ PPV, 10 p.m. ET
Middleweight: Israel Adesanya (c) vs. Sean Strickland
Heavyweight: Tai Tuivasa vs. Alexander Volkov
Men's flyweight: Manel Kape vs. Felipe dos Santos
Heavyweight: Justin Tafa vs. Austen Lane
Light heavyweight: Tyson Pedro vs. Anton Turkalj
ESPN News/ESPN+, 8 p.m. ET
Light heavyweight: Carlos Ulberg vs. Da Woon Jung
Men's featherweight: Jack Jenkins vs. Chepe Mariscal
Lightweight: Jamie Mullarkey vs. John Makdessi
Lightweight: Nasrat Haqparast vs. Landon Quiñones
ESPN+, 6:30 p.m.
Welterweight: Mike Mathetha vs. Charlie Radtke
Men's featherweight: Shane Young vs. Gabriel Miranda
Welterweight: Kevin Jousset vs. Kiefer Crosbie
(c) = defending champion
How to watch the fights
Watch the PPV and all other fights on ESPN+: Get ESPN+ here.
Watch the prelims on ESPN News and ESPN+. Download the ESPN App | WatchESPN | TV schedule
Don't have ESPN News? Get instant access.
Purchased the fight on your phone and want to stream on your TV? Find out how here.
There's also FightCenter, which offers live updates for every UFC card.
How many acts in the Israel Adesanya show? Is a Tai Tuivasa shoey on tap?
Adesanya is a showman, there's no denying that. But the middleweight champion doesn't always put on a show.
The night in 2019 when Adesanya won the belt for the first time, he did it in the swashbuckling style he'd become known for, attacking Robert Whittaker from impossible angles and dodging everything thrown back in his direction like a rubber action figure. Hands down at his side and chin stuck out as a "try to hit me" invitation, Adesanya made Whittaker look feeble before dropping him in the final seconds of Round 1 and knocking him out with a fancy flurry in the second. This appeared to be the dawning of an age of flash and flair.
But in his next five 185-pound fights, Adesanya managed just one knockout. He won every one of those bouts, but sometimes he appeared to be coasting, serving up vanilla performances. His reputation among the loudest and crankiest of the MMA fan base slipped from bodacious to boring. Adesanya rightfully refused to absorb the criticism all by himself, though, noting that on many nights, he was saddled with opponents too timid to bring a fight to him.
That will not be the case Saturday. Strickland is an aggressor and unafraid of engagement, sometimes to his detriment. He's also basic in his skills, which might sound like ridicule but is not. Strickland is solid, tough and straightforward, and he will give Adesanya a fight -- and an opportunity to pile up crowd-pleasing style points.