Former UFC fighter Daniel Cormier has lashed out at Irish MMA superstar Conor McGregor - who he has accused of saying 'disturbing' things about Khabib Nurmagomedov's late father. 

Former UFC heavyweight champion Cormier is a long-time training partner and close friend of retired mixed martial artist Khabib.

After Dustin Poirier defeated McGregor for the second time this year, 'The Eagle' tweeted out his congratulations to the American MMA fighter, saying: "Good always defeats evil."

To which 'The Notorious' replied in a now-deleted tweet: "Covid is good and father is evil?" 

Khabib's father, Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov, passed away in 2020 due to complications from COVID-19.

For Cormier (22-3, 1 NC), McGregor's antics come as no surprise, but 'DC' still feels the Irish MMA fighter has crossed a line with his remarks. 

“After the fight with Dustin Poirier, a lot of people questioned whether or not Conor McGregor was reaching to try to get in the head of Dustin Poirier,” Cormier told ESPN. “Reach back to a time where he had a trash talk that could affect people.

"It didn’t seem to work against Poirier and I feel like from him talking about Dustin’s wife, to now Khabib’s father, he is just taking it way too far.

“When you’re dealing with death and Covid and all these other things that we’ve dealt with over the last year and a half, that’s all off-limits.”

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McGregor (22-6) also branded Poirier's wife Jolie - who also helps run The Good Fight Foundation - a 'little h--' in his post-fight interview, and alleged she had slid into his Instagram direct messages in the build-up to the fight.

Cormier is less than pleased with the manner in which he has conducted himself in and out of the Octagon.

“We talked about wives and families being off-limits, but you’re talking about a man’s ‘everything’,” the 42-year-old said. “Khabib’s dad was his ‘everything’ and you’re talking about him being gone today due to something that has been so terrible for our entire world, and you use that in a sense to get back?

“You know what's disturbing? This wasn’t done the day after the fight or the same night of the fight. This was done weeks after the fight, so it feels like it was thought of and it was thought through for Conor to tweet something like that.

"Now, I get shock value and I get trying to get people to talk, but, way too far, to the point I immediately called Khabib last night and said, ‘Hey, are you okay?'”

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Cormier also believes McGregor's trash-talking is a sign the Irishman is starting to lose his touch. 

“Honestly, when Conor does stuff like that, it’s hard to understand how there’s this mass amount of people that support that type of behaviour,” he added.

“I think when stuff like that is being said, I think it’s a cry for help.”

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