Conor McGregor fight at Croke Park discussed by Dana White as UFC President opens up on his Irish connection

Dana White has revealed he has been trying to stage a Conor McGregor fight at Croke Park "for a long time".

The UFC President will be at the 3Arena next month to watch Cork boxer Callum Walsh fight on Irish soil for the first time as a professional. White has supported the 23-year-old, whose bouts are shown on UFC Fight Pass, and will fly to Dublin to watch him defend his WBC Continental Americas Super Welterweight title against Przemyslaw Runowski on September 20.

However, White says he has had many conversations with McGregor about staging one of his fights at GAA Headquarters but that a number of factors made it tough to do so.

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He told Off The Ball: "I've been trying to do Croke Park for a long time with Conor McGregor and we couldn't get it done because they wouldn't keep the public transportation open, they had a curfew on us. There were lots of things that made it tough."

The UFC staged a big show in Manchester last month, on which three Irish fighters (Shauna Bannon, Kiefer Crosbie and Caolan Loughran) fought, with the event taking place at the traditional American PPV time, meaning the main card didn't begin until 3am local time. A similar situation would be expected if they were to stage an event involving McGregor at Croke Park.

The former two-weight champion revealed last year that he was confident he would fight at the 82,000+ stadium "at some stage".

Dana White with Conor McGregor
(Image: Jeff Bottari/Zuffa LLC)

Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn has also looked into staging a Katie Taylor fight at Croke Park, but has suggested that the costs to hire the stadium might be too much to overcome.

Undisputed super lightweight champion Taylor fought twice at the 3Arena last year, losing to Chantelle Cameron in May before avenging that defeat in November, and White says he has had no difficulties in hiring the venue for Walsh's fight.

"There hasn't been a problem doing this," White said of the September 20 event. "I know what we're doing, how we're going to do it."

The 55-year-old added that he wants to bring the UFC back to Dublin in the future, with the promotion's last show here coming nine years ago.

White also spoke of his Irish connection, having grown up in Boston and spending time here when he was younger.

He explained: "I grew up in Boston and I was around a lot of Irish people, I spent some time in Ireland when I was younger and the Conor McGregor connection, we have like six Irish fighters (in the UFC), every time I go over to Ireland I have a blast.

"I love the people, I love the place, I don't know how much more I could tell you about my connection to Ireland."

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