Michael Chandler believes he will end the fame of Conor McGregor when he defeats him in their Las Vegas fight in June. For “Iron,” a significant part fueling his thrill to enter the cage with the Irish is the lust for revenge after he lost more than a year of fighting just to wait for the bout to be set.
McGregor shared the initial details of the fight before New Year’s Day and confirmed that he will return with a match against Chandler. The UFC still hasn’t confirmed the fight, but the American has high hopes about it, sharing that he now has plans for his training to prepare for it. And for Chandler, the event will be the last one fans will express interest in “The Notorious.”
“I do,” Chandler told ESPN’s Brett Okamoto when asked whether he saw himself as the final nail in McGregor’s coffin. “I think I’ll be the last person. I think he’s lost fights, but I think we haven’t really seen him be dominated. He was getting beat by Poirier and then obviously had the injury. He got beat by Poirier the first time obviously, but I think I dominate him in a fashion that it’s almost as if he can keep trying to come back but he will have lost the fans interest so much more after I do to him what I’m gonna do to him on June 29.”
The wait has been long for Chandler, who entered The Ultimate Fighter Season 31 with McGregor as coach. The two were expected to meet by the end of the show, but that never happened. After this, the wait continued, with Chandler making a series of criticisms to McGregor, expressing doubt that the Irish would still return to the cage.
Thankfully, despite still not having a word from UFC itself, Chandler now has something to hold on to after McGregor announced their fight details. For the fighter, nonetheless, this won’t erase his rage for having to halt his return for too long just to wait for McGregor. This, as Chandler believes, deserves an act of revenge when he meets McGregor in the octagon.
“…There’s definitely a certain aspect of that revenge aspect, make him pay for the last year,” said Chandler. “Some of it was outside of his control, but some of it, a lot of it, he created. I knew what I signed up for. I knew I signed up to do The Ultimate Fighter against a guy who was coming back from a devastating leg injury and it could have been delayed but I didn’t think it would be delayed this long and all of that is just deposits in the bank of me just wanting to absolutely smash this dude.”
