Ilia Topuria gets honest on Conor McGregor matchup: “He’s almost finished.”
Ilia Topuria has left the door open for a future fight with Conor McGregor, but he is not dressing it up as a meeting of two fighters in the same place competitively. Speaking about the idea of facing the former two-division UFC champion, Topuria said the UFC had already discussed the matchup with him and that he would accept it if the promotion made the offer today.
At the same time, the Spanish-Georgian Topuria gave a blunt view of where McGregor stands, saying that if McGregor gets a win and puts together a comeback, then the conversation could change, while adding that everyone knows “sports-wise” he is “almost finished.”
Ilia Topuria on Conor McGregor: “Sports-wise, we know he’s almost finished”
Speaking in an interview with Ariel Helwani, Ilia Topuria explained his position on a potential Conor McGregor bout. he said:
“If I get offered that fight, then we’ll see. If he gets a win, a comeback, he wins his next fight, and I get offered that fight, we will see. But I never close the door for those kinds of opportunities even if we are not on the same level right now. maybe on the popularity level, he’s more popular, and people know him, sports-wise, we all know that he’s almost done.”
That quote lands at a very different point in Topuria’s career now. Topuria moved beyond lightweight rumors and took the belt outright, knocking out Charles Oliveira to become UFC champion at 155 pounds. His next step is already set as well, with the UFC booking him to defend the title against interim champion Justin Gaethje at the White House event on June 14, a title unification bout that will headline the promotion’s historic card in Washington.
The other half of the story is McGregor’s long absence. He has not fought in the UFC since his July 2021 loss to Dustin Poirier, the bout that ended with McGregor suffering a serious leg injury. His planned return against Michael Chandler at UFC 303 in June 2024 was then scrapped because of a broken toe suffered in training, extending the uncertainty around his comeback even further. That inactivity is a major reason Topuria feels comfortable speaking so directly about McGregor’s standing as an active fighter.
Topuria has sounded skeptical about McGregor for a while. In a separate appearance discussed after his Joe Rogan interview, he questioned whether McGregor’s lifestyle and long layoff still match the demands of elite MMA, while Rogan also voiced doubt that McGregor would return in any meaningful way. Even so, Topuria stopped short of rejecting the fight outright. His position is simple: if McGregor wins, rebuilds some momentum, and the UFC brings him the offer, he is willing to look at it.
With the lightweight title already around his waist and Justin Gaethje waiting in his next defense, McGregor is no longer the fight that moves his career forward in sporting terms. If that matchup ever happens, it would be because of its scale and attention, not because Topuria needs it.
