Team Ryano’s John Redmond claimed that Conor McGregor may have potentially lost him a fight against SBG Ireland’s Charlie Ward on Friday night
Andy Ryan, the head of Irish MMA outfit Team Ryano also opened up at his disappointment with how the situation involving McGregor was handled.
Ryan also stated that there is ‘no disrespect’ between both teams (via MMAFighting):
“There is no disrespect here between our team and Conor’s team. Honestly, he came over and he told both me and John that he respected us. The only thing he said was, ‘Come on, Andy, John was out.’
“I agreed with him. Even if the fight had been allowed to continue we were going to wave it off. Marc Goddard came over and he said that the fight was still on, but we had already made the decision. I didn’t see the punch, but I could see how disoriented John Redmond was so I wasn’t going to allow him to continue.
“I wasn’t worried about what was going on inside the cage, I was worried about everything else. There was a lot of drink taken in the arena, and I was just afraid all hell was going to break loose.”
Ryan lamented how McGregor’s actions may impact MMA in Ireland and claimed that the celebrity status of the UFC lightweight champion may be a bad thing for the sport in his homeland:
“The problem in Ireland is that people only know Conor McGregor and the UFC, they don’t look beyond that and see the amateur scene and the dedicated professionals that are trying to make it to the big stage,” he said.
“I just think the promotions wanted that. They wanted that big WWE scene in the cage. Irish MMA doesn’t want that, but the promotions certainly do.
“I think everyone knows Conor shouldn’t have done what he did, but what can you do? The real problem is that the sport doesn’t have proper recognition in the country so there is no way to put safeguards in place to make sure these things don’t happen.”
And as for the consequences of the bout for his fighter’s career? Ryan believes Redmond and Ward should do it again:
“I think it’s left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth. Nobody in Ireland wanted to see this happen, and I know if the two lads went in there again they could show everyone how it was meant to go down,” he said.
“I think they both looked a lot better than they have previously, and I think with all the confusion after the knockdown, it’s probably the right thing to do.”
