As I start to write this, the clock is striking 1am BST.
And this is what I’m looking at.
90 minutes after the third press conference of the Conor McGregor vs. Floyd Mayweather promotional world tour was supposed to start and there is still no sight of Conor or Floyd.
Hell, there’s not even a sight of Paulie Malignaggi or Brendan Schaub, the pair of analysts who were tasked with eating up time on the Showtime Sports streams on Tuesday and Wednesday before McGregor and Mayweather took to the stage.
There was some element of impatience on Wednesday night, when the pre-presser preamble went on slightly too long but Thursday night took the absolute piss.
As fight fans on this side of the Atlantic stayed up long after midnight, frantically refreshing their YouTube streams, messages arrived from those in-the-know that the delay was showing no signs of coming to an end.
We're still in the back doing interviews and no one seems to be in a rush, so it doesn't seem any time soon. https://t.co/d94wwhhYaz
— Ariel Helwani (@arielhelwani) July 13, 2017
30mins.
— Coach JK (@John_Kavanagh) July 13, 2017
Neither guy has even arrived at venue, Floyd made Conor wait 40 minutes yesterday so now they are trying 2 outdo each other with tardiness. https://t.co/ID60dj9l7E
— Paul Malignaggi (@PaulMalignaggi) July 13, 2017
John Kavanagh’s predicted 30 minutes elapsed and eager fans in the UK and Ireland began dropping like flies on the livestream.
This was Axl Rose levels of keeping the audience waiting.
Neither man wanted to be the first to show up and give the edge to the other. That’s what it seemed like, at least.
But, as for those on social media, they had their own theories about why the fighters were late to the New York party.
https://twitter.com/ChrisAhernRadio/status/885641964020011008
https://twitter.com/kallan_thfc/status/885642025311363073
https://twitter.com/collinsz10/status/885643735312343041
The delay for the mcgregor press conference is because of traffic Via ESPN. pic.twitter.com/l7FuVD5jNq
— ——DATA Operator——🇺🇸 (@jknightlinger) July 13, 2017
https://twitter.com/seanyAdams1984/status/885646241459302400
Mcgregor vs Mayweather New York press conference delayed because Mayweather brought the wrong school bag! #MayweatherMcGregor
— Craig (@Creay45) July 13, 2017
https://twitter.com/DavidLaine/status/885643960080896000
https://twitter.com/DerekRudler/status/885647601231695872
