Michael Chandler won't wait for UFC star Conor McGregor to return from injury and is instead targeting a fight against Dustin Poirier.
Chandler has seemingly had a change of mind after doubling down on his call out of former two-weight champion McGregor just days ago. 'Iron Mike' claimed a clash with McGregor is the biggest fight to make in MMA, but with the Irishman's return date still unclear Chandler has switched his focus to McGregor's rival Poirier.
The former Bellator champion said of McGregor: "I've called him out in a respectful manner. Conor, when you're ready to come back, whenever you are ready, whenever the leg is 100 per cent healed because the UFC as a promotion is better with Conor in it. We need to see a healthy Conor inside the octagon so he doesn't need to rush back. We'll see when he comes back, so I'm not waiting."
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McGregor isn't expected to fight until early 2023 having spent over a year away from the cage after his leg break against Poirier last July. Chandler, who expects some fight news involving him and Poirier to be revealed "pretty soon", cleared the air on a run-in he had with Poirier whilst they were cageside at UFC 276 earlier this month.
"I walked down there and all of a sudden I heard some chirping, some very vile venom being spat in my direction that I didn't know if it was being thrown at me or not," Chandler said. "I looked over and Dustin Poirier was pointing at me so he obviously had a bone to pick with me that night."
WARNING: STRONG LANGUAGE
Poirier could be heard calling Chandler "a fake motherf***er” in the heated exchange whilst telling his rival “I’ll f*** you up.” Chandler has told Poirier that confronting him at a public event is the wrong way to go about seeking a fight, insisting that the run-in has not cost him any sleep and Poirier's anger will only work against him if they meet in the cage.
"If you think that's the way you're going to get a fight with me, that's the absolute opposite way," he added. "I'm not here to get into physical altercations in a public form. It's not going to make it that much easier to knock him out whenever he oversteps if him and I do step inside of the octagon, but I have not lost one minute of sleeping thinking about Dustin Poirier."
