KSW see ‘no medical issue’ behind James McSweeney’s withdrawal from Mariusz Pudzianowski bout

It was a bizarre scene at the 3 Arena when iconic Polish heavyweight Mariusz Pudzianowski weighed in alongside two potential opponents, James McSweeney and Jay Silva, ahead of tomorrow night’s KSW 40.

Although initially slated to meet McSweeney, Pudzianowski will now meet Silva in the main event of the Dublin card.

Speaking exclusively to MMAFighting.com, KSW CEO Martin Lewandowski claimed that it was the promotion’s decision to pull McSweeney from the card as Safe MMA UK had yet to medically clear him despite the Brit beginning the process five weeks ago.

As far as Lewandowski is concerned, there is “no medical issue” behind McSweeney’s withdrawal.

“The process of having him medically cleared has been going on for the last five weeks, but the outcome of that was only finalized today,” said Lewandowski.

“It wasn’t finalized by the fighter or Safe MMA, it was mine and my business partner’s decision.

“We assumed that the worst-case scenario would be James being withdrawn from the card for some medical issue, but there was no medical issue behind what happened in my opinion.”

Back in January, Sweeney appeared on an episode of Jon and Mike’s MMA Corner and stated he had been forced to retire due to “medical issues”. He revealed that he been diagnosed with epilepsy and had suffered a stroke.

Last night, Safe MMA released a statement that cited McSweeney as the only fighter from the event whose medical clearance was still pending.

Knowing that McSweeney could potentially be pulled from the event, KSW called upon UFC and Bellator veteran Jay Silva to have on standby a week out from the event.

“We knew when we hired James that he had some kind of issue with epilepsy. He made his own comments publicly, but he had his own explanations for this,” said Lewandowski.

“I predicted that it could be an issue and I had to be secure knowing that the worst case scenario could happen. This is why we have Jay Silva waiting with all of his medicals.

“His situation was crazy. We had to get his passport sorted within two days and we had to get the medicals done. We called him only a week before the event.”

Lewandowski went on to state that the promotion was forced to make a decision as McSweeney’s status was still pending a day before the event.

“The story is a crazy one and we can talk about it more on Monday. All I can say is that I’m not comfortable working with Safe MMA at the moment.

“We were forced to make the decision because we were still waiting for approval for James. This event is happening tomorrow, we had to do something about it for all the parties that are involved.”

Lewandowski revealed that McSweeney would receive some compensation and insisted that he would fight for the promotion in the future on Polish soil.

“For sure, we will pay him. I don’t want to talk about the amount. He won’t be treated as if he fought because he didn’t.

“It wasn’t his fault, but he did do the interview. He said that he had epilepsy and we knew about it, so we’re both responsible for it.

“I feel this is not a question of his health. He may not be able to fight in Ireland, but he will fight in Poland. I don’t want to say when, but it will be within half a year for sure.”