Conor McGregor’s long-time coach John Kavanagh has broken his silence on “Notorious'” actions at Bellator 187.
At the event in Dublin, McGregor hopped over the cage to hug his training partner Charlie Ward. Referee Marc Goddard separated the two as a decision on whether or not his opponent John Redmond survived the round wasn’t made. Also, McGregor was not in Ward’s corner.
As a result of Goddard pushing McGregor, the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) lightweight title holder charged the referee and shoved him from behind. Additionally, McGregor appeared to slap a Bellator official.
During a recent appearance on the 6 O’clock Show, Kavanagh talked about the incident (via MMAFighting.com):
“Charlie is one of Conor’s very close friends and he’s coming off two pretty devastating losses. He lost fast and hard in both his UFC fights and was dropped by the UFC and then he fought on Bellator. So, when you’re seeing someone that you’re that close with, with two bad defeats and then has a great victory in front of his hometown crowd…he got a bit emotional, jumped in and he didn’t realize that the fight had no actually been called.”
He went on to say that the finish should’ve been obvious as Ward’s opponent wasn’t going to recover.
“He thought when he knocked the guy down it was over, but it was actually just the end of the round. The fight wasn’t over. The referee was trying to tell him that the fight was over. It was pretty obvious it was over, in his defense. He was a little bit over emotional there, but you sort of understand when you know his and Charlie’s relationship over the last number of years.”
