UFC’s Khamzat Chimaev says he went to ‘beat up’ Conor McGregor in Ireland but was sent home to Sweden

Khamzat Chimaev has been calling out Conor McGregor on social media following his breakout stint on UFC Fight Island. But the Chechen-born Swedish star had a bone to pick with “The Notorious” long before he came to prominence in Abu Dhabi with two dominant TKO wins in 10 days.

The animosity surrounding Nurmagomedov and McGregor’s grudge match in 2018, when the bad blood spilled outside the cage before and after the fight with physical and verbal altercations, was so strong that Chimaev (8-0) travelled to Ireland around the time of his pro debut to confront former two-division champion McGregor.

“At that time, I was fighting as an amateur, or a pro record of 1-0, when that happened,” Chimaev said in Russian to journalist Adam Zubayraev, who translated the comments. “It is that time when he insulted Khabib, and he also was talking about Zubaira [Tukhugov]. At that time, nobody knew who I was. He was also talking about another guy who’s also Chechen. I don’t remember his name, but he told us he knocked him out in a sparring session.

“My mind was blowing up at the moment, but I’m living here very close to him. I was thinking that I would catch him in the streets or at the gym and beat him up. This is what he deserved.”

Chimaev said he landed in Ireland and waited at the airport, claiming he was stopped at first by officials before being let go.

“Then I was going out. When I was going out from the airport, they stopped me again. That time, there were guys literally in uniform,” he said. “Yes, there were [special forces] and they told me, ‘You cannot go anywhere.’ But I didn’t get what they meant. At that time, my English was very bad. Even right now, it’s not that good.”

The 26-year-old said he was then driven to a police station and held for eight hours in a cell, but he wasn’t interrogated.

“I was doing push-ups and squats. They didn’t even bring me food. Then after a while, they told me, ‘You have to go back to Sweden’,” he said. “They continued, ‘We’ll bring you back to the airport where the plane is waiting for you’. They brought me back to airport and sent me back home.”

“Honestly speaking, I wanted to beat him up,” Chimaev said. “Many people thought I was coming there to help him to prepare for Khabib. Not only for Khabib. I was coming there to protect our pride and honour. I was going there for all of us. If that would not have happened, I would have maybe thrown, I don’t know, some object. I think I was able to stand for myself.”