Apart from the Tony Ferguson matchup, another major fight that was presented to Khabib Nurmagomedov is against Conor McGregor. At one point, talks circulated about making this fight in Khabib’s home country of Russia.
Khabib’s manager Ali Abdelaziz, however, is not counting on this fight to ever happen. For one thing, he feels it is a matchup that the UFC does want from the get-go.
“90 percent of the time, Dana White will put the best guys together,” Abdelaziz told Yahoo! Sports’ Kevin Iole in a recent interview. “But when it comes to one guy, Conor, I don’t think Dana’s gonna put him against the best guy.”
Abdelaziz is also firm on the belief that McGregor is avoiding the fight at all costs, especially since he will be putting his legacy on the line. With that said, he foresees a matchup between Khabib and Georges St-Pierre to be more of a possibility.
“In a way, I don’t believe Conor believes he has a chance with Khabib,” Abdelaziz said. “This is why I don’t think this fight will ever happen.”
“The whole thing is this: If Khabib goes out there and demolishes him, and that’s what’s going to happen, this whole Conor thing is gone,” he added. “All the aura, all the prediction [expletive] is gone. There’s no more Conor. There’s no more two million pay-per-view buys. There’s no more Floyd Mayweather rematch.”
“They can make all these rematches, but they’re not going to do the big numbers because they know, man. They’re smart. But look, Conor is scared. He’s nervous. Why would you want to fight a guy who is going to eat your soul?”
“You will see Khabib vs. Georges St-Pierre before you can see Conor vs. Khabib.”
Before Khabib can look at his next options, he must first get through Ferguson when they fight for the UFC 155-pound title at UFC 223 on April 7th in Brooklyn.
About the author
