‘The Biggest Fight In UFC History’: Khabib VS McGregor

One-sided fight ends with both fighters receiving suspensions

The Biggest Fight In UFC History: Khabib VS McGregor

Randy Abbott, Editor n Chief

***Opinion pieces reflect the opinion of the writer only, and not the opinion of the newspaper staff, student body, administration or school faculty.***

The biggest fight in UFC history took place this past weekend at UFC 229. Conor McGregor Vs Khabib Numagomedov for the UFC light weight championship.

This fight has been in the making since April 3 of this year. At the UFC 223 press media day Khabib and his camp had a minor altercation with Artem Lobov who is a part of the SBGI team which is the camp Conor trains with. When Conor heard about the altercation, he and the rest of the SBGI camp flew to the open media event and proceed to attack a bus that Khabib was on. Conor was later arrested for his actions. The case would not be put to rest until July 26.

The week the civil case was over, the fight the world has been waiting for was announced. This would be McGregor’s first fight in two years for the UFC and his first fight in one year since his boxing match with Floyd Mayweather.

The times before the fight that the two fighters had interactions were really tense. Numagomedov was the most tense he had ever been before a fight and McGregor’s trash talk was even bigger than it’s ever been before.

The fight started with Conor going right after Khabib. This was expected because this is what Conor is known for. Khabib would take him to the ground early and would wrestle him on the mat for the rest of the first round.

Round two would start the same way but McGregor blocked one of the takedown attempts by Khabib. Conor started unloading lefts and rights on Khabib but Conor would be caught with a solid right hand by Khabib and was taken to the ground and wrestled down to end round two showing that Khabib was in control of the fight.

In the third round we saw a revamped Conor and he stared right into Khabib’s eyes and blocking everything that Khabib would bring his way. Conor blocked three of the take-down attempts by Khabib. This was the best round for McGregor because he lost the first and the second-round big time.

The fourth round it was clearly shown that Conor was gassed out from his comeback in the third round. Khabib was able to take Conor down and apply the behind-the-neck choke on McGregor, forcing him to tap out.

After the fight Khabib would jump over the octagon and would attack Dannis Dillion, one of the McGregor’s corner men. Soon after Khabib’s cousin, Abubaker would climb into the octagon and attack McGregor from behind. Another one of the corner men for Khabib, identified as Zubaria Tuckugov, would also attack McGregor.

The octagon was cleared out by Las Vegas police. Both men and their camps were not in the octagon when Khabib was announced the winner.

After the big mess it was announced by Dana White, president of the UFC, that three of Khabib’s members were placed under arrest but would later be released because McGregor did not want to press charges on the men.

In the press conference White said that the Nevada State Athletic commission would be looking at the incident and Khabib could possibly get his visa taken away for his actions. The commission is holding his pay until they decide his punishment.

 “You cannot talk about religion. You cannot talk about nation,” Numagomedov said in his press conference Kahbib said. He said that his actions were made for the trash talk that McGregor was saying leading up to the fight.

The fight was a overall good fight. What happened after the fight by Khabib was classless on his part. He had just beaten if not one of the best MMA fighters on the planet. Trash talking is apart of the game and he needs to realize it. I think he should be stripped of this title and I hope he gets at least a year suspension from the Nevada State Athletic Commission because his actions were uncalled for after the fight.

Will there ever be a rematch? I do not know if it would be really nice to see, but what happened after the fight I can live to not see one because it was just awful, especially what happened after the fight. Although since Conor is wanting a rematch he will be determined to win, just look at his rematch with Nate Diaz. Personally I would like to see McGregor Vs Diaz III.