Legendary UFC heavyweight Junior Dos Santos believes that Conor McGregor has ducked the challenge of Charles Oliveira for his UFC comeback.
McGregor is currently recovering from a broken leg, and has insisted that he will fight for a world title when he returns to action later this year or early next. Oliveira, who is the lightweight champion in all but name, has consistently called out the Irishman, but he has since claimed that he wants to come back at welterweight.
Back in 2016, McGregor won the lightweight belt to become the first ever simultaneous champion in UFC history having taken featherweight gold the previous December. And he now wants to win an unprecedented third weight world title by moving up to welterweight, where he has beaten Nate Diaz and Donald Cerrone despite concerns about his size.
And Dos Santos, a former heavyweight champion, believes that McGregor is "ducking" Oliveira, who is now set to face Islam Makhachev for the vacant lightweight title in October. The Brazilian was lightweight champion heading into his last fight with Justin Gaethje, but he missed weight by half-a-pound, and as such has been stripped despite comfortably beating Gaethje.
"Did you see that not long ago he [Oliveira] challenged McGregor? And McGregor is kind of ducking," Dos Santos said on the Podpah podcast. "Of course, we know, just ducking. It's obvious he won't want to, it's a bad fight for him.
"Damn, it's obvious, and then, they're wanting to put him against that Makhachev. Islam Makhachev, who's a monster. It looks like he will accept the fight against Makhachev, hoping that Khabib [Nurmaomedov] will come out of retirement to fight him later."
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Oliveira has previously stated that he doesn't mind holding up the lightweight division in order to get a profitable fight with McGregor, despite protests from the likes of Makhachev. He had a number of unfavourable match-ups for lower pay during his early career including at one time losing four of six fights during a disastrous streak of results.
He is now interested in earning as much as possible while he has the UFC gold, which could be enough to attract McGregor into a fight. However, the Irishman argues that having won two belts already, he wants to further make history by winning a third against Kamaru Usman, instead of getting back down to lightweight.
First, McGregor must get back to fitness after finally returning to his MMA gym SBG Ireland HQ earlier this month. He has been spotted training with Bellator's Darragh Kelly, and his coach John Kavanagh insists that he "hasn't missed a beat".
