SBG Ireland’s head coach, John Kavanagh isn’t afraid to speak his mind. While Conor McGregor’s rise to fame saw Kavanagh and SBG Ireland becoming prominent names in the mixed martial arts world, John is still refreshingly honest about his fighters.

Talking to ESPN, Kavanagh heaped praises on Bellator MMA, ahead of the organisation’s visit to the United Kingdom with the European Fight Series. John even said that Bellator MMA will revolutionize European MMA circuit, and will be the promotion to properly pay the fighters.

Bellator MMA Changed Lives Of SBG Ireland’s Fighters – John Kavanagh

“Bellator overnight have changed the lives of a huge amount of my guys, financially”, Kavanagh told ESPN’s Chamatkar Sandhu. “For me as a trainer it’s huge. After all these years of having to do these European shows just enough so that the guys can fight in America and actually earn some money, now they can do it here.

“I’m very excited, it’s been a great morale lift for all my guys. There’s a great energy in the gym right now and I’m looking forward to this year and the coming years, making that relationship with Bellator even stronger.”

“Bellator are going to be really the only show that regularly visits European cities that can give the fighters a decent pay day. There are some other good European based shows, but the level of pay is so low it’s more like the pros are amateurs.

“There’s nobody that can make a living fighting on European shows, whereas at Bellator, they’re actually being paid like regular fighters — they can train full time and just focus on fighting, rather than having to work security on the weekends or work nine to five and train early in the morning or late at night.”

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