After their long-awaited showdown in the main event of UFC 303 was postponed due to Conor McGregor breaking his pinky toe, Michael Chandler now has his sights set on fighting him at the upcoming ‘Riyadh Season Noche FC’ event at The Sphere in Las Vegas on September 14th.
“Sphere would be great,” Chandler told MMAjunkie. “It’s 10 weeks away. I’m not a doctor, but I know a pinky toe doesn’t take too long to heal. That would be massive. It sounds to me like it’s going to be a one-and-done type of event.
“Dana has touted it as the biggest event in UFC history, and it may never be done (again), and if you want to do the numbers that they want to do, it seems as though this fight between myself and Conor would fit the bill. I am not the one to make those decisions, but the UFC knows I always have my work boots on and I’m ready to go tomorrow if they want to go.”
McGregor himself has hinted at a potential August or September return, but the situation appears to still be as clear as mud given that in a recent interview Dana White appeared to rule out the possibility of McGregor competing at that event, or any other in the coming months.
When asked in a Barstool Sports interview last Thursday whether McGregor would return in August, September or October, White’s blunt response was, “None of the above.”
A few days later at the UFC 303 post-fight press conference, White suggested that he was eager to stop discussing the McGregor situation altogether.
“From here on I’m not going to talk about it until when he’s healed and he’s right,” White told reporters. “Then we’ll look at the landscape and see what we can figure out.”
So it seems like everything is still very much up in the air as to whether McGregor will return or not, but Chandler has suggested that there might be some clarity coming his way in the coming weeks.
“I think we’ll know a lot in the next week or two about how this is going to play out,” Chandler said. “I’ve gotten that question a lot over the last year, you know, about a timeline. Is there a certain date [to move on from McGregor]? When do you pull the plug? When do you, you know, insert a catchphrase here.
“And I haven’t really thought about it, but I know that some information is going to be coming my way very soon, and we’ll figure it out.”
