Firas Zahabi is one of the greatest trainers today, which includes leading Georges St. Pierre to the UFC Welterweight Title.
When it comes to UFC Lightweight Champion Conor McGregor boxing Floyd Mayweather this August, the famed trainer thinks the UFC champion may need to do some borderline illegal stuff to get the best of Mayweather.
“I would take it a different approach. I would rough Mayweather up. Rough him up, physically,” Zahabi said to Bloody Elbow. “Grab him, throw him, drop him on the floor, do borderline illegal stuff. Get him thinking ‘what is this? I don’t know how to grapple with this guy. I don’t know what an overhook is. I don’t know what an underhook is. I don’t know what this type of clinching is.’ And he’s gonna get tired. Mayweather would get tired from clinching. If you haven’t done a lot of clinching in your life, it’s extremely exhausting.”
McGregor enters the fight with a huge experience disadvantage, as Mayweather has fought 49 more professional bouts that McGregor has (0).
Zahabi also shines some light on what he would tell McGregor is he were cornering him during the super fight.
“If McGregor was my student and I was coaching him, I would tell him every time, ‘you can can rough him up. Grab the back of his neck. Trip him. Shove him into the ropes. Shove him through the ropes, whatever. Rough this guy up, make him forget about boxing. And of course, look to land the left,” says Zahabi.
Conor McGregor versus Floyd Mayweather takes place on Saturday, August 26 from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. Fightful is providing live coverage of the event, with a post-show podcast to follow.
