– Paul Dollery reports from Las Vegas
NATE DIAZ AND Conor McGregor put their differences to one side — for now at least — at the end of an epic encounter here in Las Vegas.
However, Diaz was critical of his opponent for the manner in which he opted to evade danger during their five-round thriller, which headlined UFC 202 at the T-Mobile Arena.
On several occasions, McGregor jogged away from the exchanges to safety when Diaz sought to apply pressure. It was a tactic which clearly irritated Diaz — as did the judging.
McGregor took a majority decision on scores of 48-47, 47-47, 48-47. The Dubliner won the first two rounds, as well as the fourth. The third and fifth rounds went to Diaz, with one judge awarding him a 10-8 in round three.
“I thought I won at least three rounds to two,” Diaz told reporters afterwards. “I didn’t think that was even a question. Obviously I feel like I could have done some better things but I thought I won the fight.
“They gave it to him and I don’t want to sound all bitter because it’s all good — I got paid, it’s all good, you know what I’m saying? — but I don’t think he did much. He did a lot of running in that fight. I’ve been saying, and my brother’s been saying for years, like in Pride, he should have got a yellow card for that type of thing.
He ran the whole fight. You see me chasing him around? I was pointing at him like, ‘Where are you going? Are you scared to engage?’ I feel like they should have took points for that.
“On top of me winning anyway, I think they should have took points, which wouldn’t have let him win the fight. That’s how I feel about the whole fight, the whole situation.”
Diaz also claimed that he had carried knee and rib injuries into the fight: “That isn’t some excuse either. I’ve got the whole thing on tape. I hurt my knee about a month ago so I wasn’t able to train jiu-jitsu for the last month.
“Then about two weeks after that I was just sparring boxing and I really hurt my rib. I got hit in the body… and that put me out of sparring about two-and-a-half weeks ago. I’ve got that all on tape, just to set it off and not make excuses because I’ve got that all videoed up.
“He should have finished me off. If I would have been fighting me, I would have taken me clean out. That’s my take on the whole fight. I don’t mean to sound bitter because it’s all good.”
Diaz and McGregor have already expressed their interest in facing each other for a third time, but on this occasion in the more familiar environs of the lightweight (155lbs) division. Their two bouts so far have been contested at welterweight (170lbs).
Asked when he’d like that fight to happen, Diaz — who insisted that he won’t take any fight other than a rubber match with McGregor — said: “Whenever they’re ready to rock. I’m not doing shit until round three. You’re not going to see me until then.
If they want to set it up as soon as possible, let’s do it.”
Despite some friction between the two camps, which came to a head during a bout of missile-throwing at Wednesday’s press conference, Diaz and McGregor put their differences to one side after the fight.
“The fight was over,” explained Diaz, who had finally scored a takedown on McGregor in the dying moments. “We just fought 25 minutes. He tried, I tried to take each other out and it didn’t get done. It’s like, ‘Hey man, until next time, it’s all good, until we’re set to go again it’s all good’.
“What do you want to me to do — keep kicking the guy while he was down? It’s all good, the fight was over.”
