Georges St-Pierre finally revealed the reason for the delay of his UFC return.
After announcing Georges St-Pierre’s Octagon return against Michael Bisping in March, the UFC decided to scrap the fight earlier this month. According to UFC president Dana White, it was because St-Pierre would only be available to fight around November.
The former long-time welterweight champion never gave a reason why he will be out for that long until Friday, at the C2 Montréal conference. According to him, it was because of a nagging injury.
"Trust me, I'm not the kind of guy who thinks, 'Hey, I'm going to make everybody wait for me. I don't want to fight during the summer, I want to take my time,’” St-Pierre said (via MMA Fighting). "That's not the reason. If it were up to me, I would come back. The reason is I had a problem with my eye. I had an injury."
"My vision has not been back yet. It will be back. It's something very minor. The doctor insisted for me that I don't spar until September."
Everything seemed fine with St-Pierre upon the announcement of the fight, and during the press conference with Bisping ahead of UFC 209. But apparently, he already had the injury upon signing his new contract in February, which the UFC had full knowledge of.
"The UFC was aware of it. They knew I couldn't fight during the summer, but they still insisted on doing that press conference with Michael Bisping,” St-Pierre explained. “And when it happened, we were not very excited about the idea, but we wanted that fight, so we decided to do it, but then it turned into a negative thing because it took so long.
"But UFC knew. Everyone knew. The people concerned knew that that was the case, but they still tried to put pressure on me to fight in July. That's the reason why I'm coming out public today about the reason why I'm not fighting this summer."
Bisping, meanwhile, has also been forced to the sidelines due to a knee injury, with no specific timetable for his return. The UFC, in turn, has booked an interim middleweight title fight between Yoel Romero and Robert Whittaker, which will take place as the co-headliner of UFC 213 in July.