Dustin Poirier and Conor McGregor will take their squabble to the octagon
Conor McGregor said a couple days ago he was calling off his summer fight with Dustin Poirier during a Twitter squabble between the two men.
UFC had a better idea.
“Let’s settle it in the Octagon,” the league tweeted Wednesday, officially announcing that UFC 264 — headlined by McGregor-Poirier 3 — will be held July 10 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
UFC president Dana White also announced Wednesday that the arena will be at full capacity for the event.
“Ladies and gentlemen, that’s 20,000 fans,” White said in a video tweeted by UFC.
Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak announced Tuesday that social distancing mandates will be lifted May 1 in hopes to have the state reopened to 100% capacity by June 1.
Only a few thousand fans were allowed to attend McGregor and Poirier’s January fight in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. Poirier won by second-round knockout, avenging a 106-second knockout at the hands of McGregor more than six years earlier.
The Twitter spat started Sunday, when Poirier accused McGregor of not fulfilling a $500,000 pledge he made to Poirier’s The Good Fight Foundation before their January bout. According to Poirier, his foundation reached out to McGregor three times but received no response.
McGregor tweeted that he hadn’t made the donation because he hadn’t received word on how the money would be used by the foundation, an assertion Poirier denied.
Jan Blachowicz rallied in the fourth and fifth rounds to hand Israel Adesanya his first loss and retain the UFC light heavyweight title.
As the back and forth continued, McGregor declared, “The fight is off btw. I’m going to fight someone else on the 10th.”
Poirier responded, “Ok.”
But Wednesday morning, McGregor confirmed to ESPN he is on board for the July fight.
“I signed my bout agreement this morning,” McGregor told Ariel Helwani. “The Mac is back in Sin City! Full house!”
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