Poirier ends trilogy with McGregor in TKO fashion

By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

In the world of sports, things may go unexpected and sometimes, storied and highly-anticipated events have to end in an anticlimactic way.

Unfortunately, the third fight between Dustin “The Diamond” Poirier and Conor “The Notorious” McGregor finished that way after the Irish striker broke his lower tibia as the first round was about to end.

The result turned out to be a technical knockout (TKO) victory for Poirier.

McGregor was leading in the first minute of the fight after landing on well-calculated leg kicks and clean jabs while at the same time displayed excellent defense to dodge Poirier’s overhand bombs.

Poirier began to answer offensively and landed one solid leg kick that was succeeded by a takedown to take command of the ground game.

However, McGregor began to close the distance and set up a wonderful guillotine choke that lasted for 15 seconds but the tremendous ground defense of Poirier allowed him to get out of danger with the clever use of the cage to reverse their positions.

In just a blink of an eye, the struggling Poirier was now on top of McGregor firing heavy elbows, grounding and pounding McGregor at will.

With 10 seconds left in the first round, both fighters got back to their feet and that’s where the major turn-around happened.

As McGregor was backpedaling to defend himself, his left leg buckled underneath him causing his ankle to twist so bad that it looked disfigured once the camera had a clear focus on his injury.

Poirier notched his second-straight lightweight victory against McGregor and is now in talks for a potential title fight against champion Charles Oliviera.