UFC heavyweight Tom Aspinall was recently called out and dragged through the mud by former two-division world champion Conor McGregor. The English-born Aspinall recently discussed how puzzled he was by the entire exchange.
Last year, ‘Notorious’ Conor McGregor took to Twitter to attack Aspinall. The Irish-born athlete said, in since-deleted Tweets:
“Bum pk. Say sayonara to that gk deal kid. Starve you and kill you I will you fing disrespectful p***k … Don’t ever speak my name in disrespect again. Mush potato head … @AspinallMMA mush head rat keep your comments to yourself.”
Aspinall is currently sponsored by the McGregor-owned Gym Kings sports apparel brand. Despite the threat, the Englishman remains sponsored by the organization.
Tom Aspinall responds to Conor McGregor
In a recent interview with Ariel Helwani on The MMA Hour, UFC heavyweight Tom Aspinall explained how confused he was by this. He said:
“I honestly don’t know [why he was so angry]. I have so much respect for Conor, I would never disrespect him or anybody else. I’m not that kind of guy. I’m an adult, I ain’t trying to beef with nobody. If I’m trying to beef with anyone, I want to be someone in my division, so we can at least have a fight and make some money off it. No idea. Literally, all I said was, ‘I’m not as interested in Conor’s fight as I was in other fights coming up.’ That was it. No disrespect meant to anybody.”
Despite death threats from Conor McGregor, Aspinall has nothing but respect for the man. He continued:
“I’m a massive fan. Conor’s a massive inspiration for me. He’s an Irish guy, I’m an English guy – they’re really close to each other, and he’s done massive things in the sport. I was a bit like, ‘Wow, I didn’t mean to offend anybody’ … I don’t want a beef with nobody, bro. We don’t need that kind of beef. But he’s angry about it, or he was – I don’t know how it feels at the moment. But who knows what he’s doing.” [Transcript courses of MMA Fighting]
See the full interview below: