Conor McGregor reveals who he is considering as his next opponent in the UFC

vt-author-image

By VT

Article saved!Article saved!

While MMA fans are focused on this Saturday's bout between Conor McGregor and Khabib Nurmagomedov in Las Vegas - in which the Irish fighter takes on an opponent who is undefeated at 26-0 - there are plenty of other fights on the horizon - including a few potential rematches for McGregor.

Speaking to ESPN's Ariel Helwani this week, McGregor not only predicted that he will win this weekend by a "devastating KO", but touched on who his next opponent could be.

Legendary MMA fighter Georges St-Pierre, former UFC welterweight and middleweight champion, has said that he would be interested in facing the winner of UFC 229's main event - which could be McGregor.

"We'll see what happens, but I don't think next," the Irishman said when asked about this proposal. "He doesn't really have anything for me personally. I'm not going to shut the door on that down the line."

He then went on to say he would like to face Anderson Silva, who he calls "a legend in the game", but said that, at the end of the day, he's only "going to do fights that interest me or have meaning".

Another option for McGregor is a third fight with Nate Diaz. The two first fought in 2016, then in 2017, with the former ending in Diaz submitting to McGregor, and the latter seeing McGregor win by majority decision. As it turns out, he's certain that they will "complete that trilogy" at some point.

"Nate Diaz will always have a rematch off of me. No matter what happens, I will always give that man his rematch. He gave me a rematch, I give him a rematch. That's the way it is. When it will happen, I don't know. We will complete that trilogy, no doubt about it," he said.

There are clearly a plethora of options for him after UFC 229, but many are wondering if he will return to boxing, after his fight against Floyd Mayweather last year.

When he was asked by the host whether a rematch, which has long been rumoured, could be on the cards, he said that it depends on whether his opponent is up to the challenge.

[[youtubewidget||https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVz_c5U05zw]]

"If he [Mayweather] has the bottle to come over and deal with this, like he said he has, let's see what happens," McGregor said. "I would also like to box him again."

He then went on to explain that he's only interested in the fight if certain conditions are met:

"Everything is being discussed. Every rule set. If it's not an MMA bout, then I don't want to know. It's either a straight MMA bout or a straight boxing bout.

"If they come looking for modified rules, I would rather just box the kid again. If you don't want to deal with it, then don't deal with it and stop going on like you're doing."

It's looking likely that Floyd and Conor will trade blows at some point in the future, but whether that's MMA or boxing is still uncertain.