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Conor McGregor offer to fight Dustin Poirier on Jan. 23 is take it or leave it, Dana White says

It appears Conor McGregor will have to wait until 2021 to get a UFC fight.

UFC president Dana White told ESPN, the promotion’s broadcast partner, that he won’t give McGregor a 2020 date as desired for a potential rematch with Dustin Poirier. Instead, the UFC has offered McGregor a Jan. 23 date for a return to the octagon, and it’s a take-it-or-leave-it situation.

“We offered him a fight. We got him his own date,” White said Wednesday. “We didn’t have a date this year. We have everything laid out for this year, with world champions fighting for titles. He wants to fight Dustin Poirier apparently, so we went to (broadcast partner) ESPN and got him his own date. He’s been offered Dustin Poirier on Jan. 23. It’s a yes or no answer.”

McGregor (22-4 MMA, 10-2 UFC) expressed interest early this year of being active and fighting “a season” with at least three fightsin 2020. The coronavirus pandemic complicated those plans.

The UFC star said on Twitter that he would accept the Poirier rematch under one condition – that it has to happen this year. White said the UFC won’t change its fight schedule to accommodate McGregor’s request and instead will remain firm on that stand.

“That’s not how it works,” White said. “We laid out this year. He was retired. Would anybody disagree he was retired? Through this crazy pandemic year we’re going through, we faced a lot of challenges. There were a lot of things done to make this thing work. We made it happen. We have our schedule laid out. Fighters have committed to it. Fighters have started training for these fights.

“Conor came back and wants to fight Dustin, so we went out and got him his own date. It’s Jan. 23.”

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