As Conor McGregor prepares for his first fight since UFC 229, the former lightweight champion is of the opinion he will be fighting for the 155-pound title on April 18th.

But, McGregor is not slated to fight at UFC 249 for the lightweight title or for anything really. In fact it is the long-awaited UFC lightweight title clash between Khabib Nurmagomedov and challenger/former interim champion Tony Ferguson who are set to headline the Barclays Center card.

McGregor feels like history will repeat itself in April, and somehow someway Khabib and Ferguson will not square off.

“Here’s the thing — realistically, Conor believes that Khabib [Nurmagomedov] vs. Tony Ferguson will not happen,” White told TMZ Sports ahead of UFC 246. “We’ve tried to do this fight many, many times. Conor believes it won’t happen. Conor wanted to do this fight at 170 because he wants to turn right around and jump right in and fight Khabib if that fight doesn’t happen.

“We’ll see how this plays out. We’ll see what happens after this. Conor is very focused on that rematch with Khabib.”

The two top lightweights have been set to fight one another four times and due to injuries and hospitalizations due to weight cutting, which reached a tipping point at UFC 229, where Ferguson was injured in the days leading up to the fight for the vacant lightweight title that saw Max Holloway, Paul Felder, and eventually Al Iaquinta set to replace Ferguson in the Barclays Center.