UFC star Michael Chandler has explained the issue he has with possibly fighting Dustin Poirier.

Last Saturday night at UFC 274, Michael Chandler produced one of the best knockouts of the year when he flatlined Tony Ferguson with an insane front kick. The win vaulted him to 2-2 in the UFC and proved, once again, that he’s easily one of the most entertaining fighters in the division.

The big question now is a pretty simple one: where will he go from here?

‘Iron Mike’ opted to call out Justin Gaethje, Charles Oliveira and Conor McGregor in his incredible post-fight interview, with arguably the biggest omission being Dustin Poirier.

‘The Diamond’ was pretty vocal on social media throughout the course of the event and made it clear that he feels he can beat the majority of 155ers around him. Chandler, meanwhile, was asked about a possible Poirier bout during an appearance on The MMA Hour - and his answer didn’t disappoint.

“It would be Diaz [between Diaz and Poirier]. I have no interest in fighting Dustin, honestly,” Chandler said. “To be quite honest, I think he’s a great dude. I think I like him for the sport, but I also think I was completely disregarded and pushed aside whenever I came into the organization. He completely disregarded me, he acted as though I didn’t deserve to be where I was.

“Maybe it’s a bit more of a personal issue, but I also don’t think... is Dustin a draw? I guess he’s the No. 2 guy [in the UFC rankings] now, but he’s just kind of stayed at No. 2 and I don’t know how active he’s going to be. I did see him tweet that I was saying everyone else’s name but his as if I didn’t want to fight him because of technical reasons or what not, but it’s more like I forgot about him.”

See you at the top

For both Poirier and Chandler, getting back to another title shot is going to be challenging, but not impossible. Charles Oliveira is the ‘number one contender’ after being stripped of the gold whereas Islam Makhachev is reportedly being lined up as the man to take him on later this year.

Conor McGregor is also in the mix and with Gaethje losing on the big stage for the second time, you’d have to think this match-up could actually make a lot of sense.

Of course, there’s the Nate Diaz factor to consider, but something tells us he’d prefer to duke it out with someone at welterweight.