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Please Show Up: Is UFC 194 Our Last Chance at Aldo vs. McGregor?

With the IV ban making weight cuts difficult and Conor McGregor already announcing his intention to move to lightweight, UFC 194 seems to be the last chance we have at seeing Aldo and McGregor compete for the featherweight title.
Photo by Rob Stothard/Zuffa LLC

When trying to measure how mainstream mixed martial arts has become in Ireland there is one particular moment that sticks out from this year that really underlined how far the sport had come.

While I'm sure there are plenty of people that think I'm referring to Conor McGregor's interim title capture at UFC 189 and others that think I'm about to cite the epic chorus of the Dublin crowd we heard in the 3 Arena only two weeks ago, both of them assumptions would be incorrect.

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The mass panic and dismay that took over Ireland when the news came though that Jose Aldo would not defend his featherweight title on July 10 was absolutely astounding. Maybe it was because the last leg of the UFC 189 World Tour press conference had been held in Dublin, an event that had the whole nation talking about the sport for better or worse. Otherwise it might have been the fact that thousands of fans were due to set out for Sin City less than a week after the news surfaced.

The only sporting moment in my lifetime that seemed to cause more upheaval was the Republic of Ireland's international soccer captain, Roy Keane, leaving the team's World Cup camp in Saipan ahead of the tournament back in 2002. I heard the news on my lunch break from school when I was 14, and when it was time to go to back I scraped my feet back up the road with my friends in complete silence, it was like a funeral march. 'The Saipan incident', as it's popularly remembered, was so divisive that it's often called "the civil war".

It was already late at night when the news came through about Aldo. Although the information about his rib had come out days earlier, nobody seemed to be ready for the finality of him pulling out. My phone rang throughout the night, it was like fans were looking for someone to tell them that it had all been some kind of sick joke.

The news was read across the radio waves and on television bulletins the next morning. As soon as people found a way to deal with Aldo's withdrawal, the debate immediately began surrounding the competency of Mendes. For days and probably longer, people who never even heard of Rickson Gracie talked about the ground game, wrestling, the dangers of getting tied up and knockout power.

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After the event, it seemed ridiculous that people got so worried about Aldo not fighting. There was absolutely no talk of how people felt let down by the absence of the Brazilian featherweight king in the wake of the groundbreaking card. The spectacle of the main event had given everybody everything that they had wanted, and most importantly for the travelling Irish contingent, 'The Notorious' won.

This weekend while he was watching his old Crumlin Boxing Gym teammates go about their business in the National Basketball Arena, McGregor spoke of the great feeling he had after he claimed the interim title back in July, in a ringside interview with Box Nation.

"It felt very good," said McGregor. "It was my third world title so it felt very nice. December 12 I'm going to unify the UFC's featherweight belt, and then continue collecting belts. It felt familiar."

Worryingly, and not for the first time since the second date for their fight has been announced, as soon as Aldo's name was brought up, the Dubliner wasted no time in relaying how unsure he was that 'Scarface' would show up on December 12.

"It's another body," he replied when asked about Aldo. "I don't care about him, it's a blank face and a new body. If he shows up he will be put away inside four minutes of the first round, but I'm still unsure whether he will make the walk. When I look into his eyes he's broken so I hope he makes that walk. We'll see."

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McGregor has made quite a name for himself for his ability to predict the future since his emergence under the UFC banner. The fact that he is already suggesting Aldo won't make it to the dance on December 12 is no only worrying because it might not happen on that date, but because it doesn't seem like the fight will happen at all if it doesn't go down next month.

The Irish interim featherweight champion has spoken about his move to lightweight quite a bit in the past too. Recently he highlighted that the ideal time to move up would be after beating the Brazilian.

"In my mind, I'm thinking, I'm going to unify the belts, I'm going to destroy the division, and then I'm going to take the lightweight division as well," he said back in September. "That's where I'm headed right now."

Aldo too has had well documented issues with making featherweight and now more than ever, without the legal use of IVs, the cut should be more challenging than ever for both men.

While there is no doubt that the two could meet at lightweight, it isn't the fight that we have been anticipating for ten months. There is a belt on the line, the one that McGregor famously took from underneath Aldo's nose in Dublin.

There is no one more worried about the timescale of this bout that UFC. The promotion have invested so much in this bout from the World Tour to the epic entrances we witnessed at UFC 189 and they won't less this matchup go without a struggle. However, should Aldo not make the fight date again, certainly McGregor seems to have plans to go on to lightweight where he no doubt has plans of a similar trajectory through the ranks.