UFC star Sean Strickland kicked Darren Till and Khamzat Chimaev out of a group chat with a host of top MMA stars after the pair trained with him earlier this year.
Strickland and a number of of other fighters from the Xtreme Couture gym in Las Vegas such as Chris Curtis invited Till and Chimaev to join them in an Instagram group to organise sparring sessions during a recent visit to America. But when the duo left to return to their Swedish training base, they were swiftly kicked from the group.
Top middleweight Marvin Vettori was also added to the group during a recent visit, but quickly removed again once their training sessions were over. Strickland explained that the chat was only to plan training, and that he would like to team up with Vettori again for a future fight camp.
"They were involved," Strickland told reporter Helen Yee when asked about Vettori, Chimaev and Till. "And then they left and they got kicked out. I kicked them out because it's training partners only.
"You come here and you enjoy this beautiful environment, you come train here, and then you leave? F*** you guys. Go, bye Marvin, go eat a pizza, go eat a lasagna."
Till will finally return to action this summer at UFC London when he faces Jack Hermansson in the co-main event at The O2 arena in London, ten months after his last outing. It remains to be seen when Chimaev will be back after a host of issues were said to have cost him a bout with Nate Diaz.
Strickland admitted that he was joking about Vettori, adding: "I love Marvin, he's a good friend of mine, I don't want to use love too much because he's Italian and Italians are a little funny, I don't want him getting the wrong idea - I don't love you like like that buddy!
"But I really like Marvin and I'd love for him to be part of my camp, or to be a part of his camp? Who's he fighting, Rob Whittaker? That's a hell of a fight, harder fight than Pereira [his own next opponent].
"I'm getting the easy route, good job Marvin, thanks for taking the hard one for me. F*** if we both win our fights we might be fighting each other."
Strickland's use of the group chat has caused hassle at his gym, with Curtis saying that he tries to arrange fights in car parks when there are arguments between members. "Unfortunately, yes," Curtis responded when asked if he was also in the group.
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"He's talking about fighting in a parking lot and I'm like 'let's be adults man', we're grown a** men and he wants to fight in a car park. When he gets arrested and his career is over he'll be going 'what did I do, why didn't anyone save me?'
"He doesn't talk it out, he skips to fighting immediately and I'm like 'let's talk first and if we can't solve it then maybe we can fight'. This motherf***er skips to fighting immediately, he proves my point!"
Strickland defended himself by adding: "There'll be beef in the chat where I'm like 'alright motherf***er let's meet up and scrap, no time limit, let's go'. No names of who it was.
"Then this motherf***er Chris Curtis is going 'fighting doesn't solve anything, let's talk'. F*** that, no, if you come to an impasse where you can't talk it out, you've got to fight."
