Dana White: Conor McGregor will return…but not at UFC 200
UFC president Dana White believes Conor McGregor must take responsibility for his omission from UFC 200.
The Irish fighter's hotly anticipated rematch with Nate Diaz has been removed from the July 9 event following a dispute over media duties.
McGregor was absent from a Madison Square Garden press conference yesterday after being stripped from the card following his failure to fulfil promotional obligations.
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The 27-year-old has requested a let-up in media work in order to allow him to focus on training, but White does not believe he should receive special treatment.
The UFC boss said McGregor will return to competition at a later date but for now must live with his decision.
"I didn't prevent Conor from fighting at UFC 200," said White. "He knew what the deal was. I told him what the deal was. He opted to do that.
"Conor's going to fight again. He's going to fight at UFC 201, 202, 203, whatever the deal might be.
"Listen, 200 is the fight everybody's been looking forward to for a long time. It is what it is. The show is going to roll on and Conor's going to fight again."
Yet despite White's claims, many UFC fans appear unimpressed with the new card for the event which features Jon Jones' rematch with Daniel Cormier for the light heavyweight title as the main event.
A live stream of the press conference for McGregor's original fight with Diaz achieved a peak audience of over 360,000 while yesterday's picked up just over 30,000.