Dana White fully believes Conor McGregor will knock out Floyd Mayweather

You can count Dana White in as a believer in Conor McGregor.

The UFC president fielded questions from the media during a conference call today and said he fully expects McGregor to shock the world when he fights Floyd Mayweather on August 26th.

"Conor worked like a dog last night, he's in great shape," he said when asked about the sparring he's seen at the UFC Performance Institute. "He's hitting really hard right now and he's in a very good place. I loved watching it last night and I feel good about this."

"I'm on his side on this thing, I want him to win, I expect him to win, I expect him to knock Floyd Mayweather out."

White dismissed comparisons to James Toney, who came into the UFC back in 2010 and got trounced by Randy Couture in just over three minutes.

"Listen, people think that Conor is going to be completely outclassed," he said. "Some people are saying that he'll never hit Floyd once. I'll tell you this, I just watched him work out last night, he looks phenomenal, he's in great shape. He hits hard and now we're fighting in 8oz. gloves and this is going to be a fight. And anything can happen in a fight."

Dana also explained the recent decision to put an interim lightweight belt on the line for UFC 216 rather than wait for McGregor to return and defend his 155 pound belt.

"Conor has told me he's going to fight again this year, but I don't know what's going to happen," he said. "You can't put these guys on the shelves all this time. We'll see what happens with this fight, and that fight [Ferguson vs. Lee] is gonna move forward and we'll see what's next for Conor."