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This content was machine-translated from the French version.
The verdict came down nine days after what was supposed to be the most anticipated return in recent MMA history. Conor McGregor suffers from a complete rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament and a meniscus tear in his right knee. The Irishman confirmed it himself on his X account on Sunday evening, July 19. Already on the operating table, the "Notorious" refuses to feel sorry for himself and announces he is targeting a return to competition for summer 2027.
Rupture of the anterior cruciate ligament confirmed
The image chilled the 15.9 million viewers — a record for a Paramount+ broadcast — who were following UFC 329 on July 11.
The image chilled the 15.9 million viewers — a record for a Paramount+ broadcast — who were following UFC 329 on July 11. Sixty-nine seconds after the start of the main event against Max Holloway, McGregor threw a roundhouse kick and collapsed, his right knee giving way on the landing. After more than five years of absence — his last appearance dating back to the tibia-fibula fracture against Dustin Poirier at UFC 264 in July 2021 — the Irishman fell twice while holding his leg, his face distorted by pain. Referee Herb Dean stopped the fight. Holloway, winner by medical TKO, struggled to hide his frustration.
Imaging exams the following week delivered a stark conclusion. "It's the same injury as in the first fight against Holloway, except this time it's the opposite leg," McGregor wrote. "It's quite shocking." The first encounter between the two men, on August 17, 2013, in Boston, had already ended with a torn anterior cruciate ligament for the Irishman — but in the left knee, and McGregor had won the fight despite the injury. On Sunday, he specified he was walking without crutches, an encouraging sign at this early stage of recovery.
The 2013 precedent, a double-edged sword
The parallel between these two summer evenings is dizzying. In 2013, McGregor was 25 years old, with a reputation still low-key outside Ireland, and above all an intact knee. Less than a year after surgery, in July 2014, he returned to the octagon in Dublin to dismantle Diego Brandao by TKO in the first round. That lightning-fast comeback propelled a trajectory that entered legend: conquest of the featherweight title against José Aldo in thirteen seconds, the first double champion in UFC history, status as the highest-paid athlete on the planet according to Forbes.
Thirteen years later, the body no longer follows the same rules. McGregor will be 38 years old in summer 2027, with twenty-eight professional fights under his belt, two leg fractures, and now two reconstructed knees. "Thanks to advances in regenerative medicine and improved training methods, I am fully capable of returning by next summer," he assured. Stem cell therapies and accelerated rehabilitation protocols were not available in 2013. The fact remains that McGregor's main opponent today is no longer Holloway or Poirier: it is time.
Six years without a win, a career in limbo
This injury reopens a file that the McGregor camp hoped was definitively closed. Since his destruction of Donald Cerrone in forty seconds in January 2020, the Irishman has not won a single fight. His trilogy against Poirier in 2021 ended in two defeats, including the second on a broken leg that kept him away for five long years. UFC 329 was supposed to be the epilogue of this journey through the desert. It has become its cruelest chapter.
Holloway, for his part, did not hide his disappointment. Beaten by decision in 2013, the former featherweight champion had made this rematch an obsession. His victory by medical stoppage does not erase the sporting dispute. The Holloway-McGregor trilogy, a dream scenario for promoters, is suspended on the Irishman's right knee.
Summer 2027, the last promise before the night
Six to nine months of rehabilitation, at the very least, for an anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction. The demands of MMA — sudden pivots, single-leg support in striking, submission defense — exceed those of football or basketball. McGregor, whose personal fortune is estimated at several hundred million dollars, will mobilize the best specialists in the world. The real question, however, goes beyond orthopedics: can a 38-year-old fighter, heavily injured in both legs in six years, regain the explosiveness and carefree attitude that made him a phenomenon?
In a lightweight division dominated by Islam Makhachev and Arman Tsarukyan, the path to a hypothetical title seems steep. McGregor, for his part, has spent his career overturning every scenario. Summer 2027 is a distant promise. It is enough for him to move forward.
