Kiwi UFC star Dan Hooker has taken his opportunity to fire shots at NZ authorities over his struggles in the build-up to his latest victory in The Octagon.
Hooker overcame a challenging month of COVID-19 lockdown to score a unanimous decision over unranked German Nasrat Haqparast at Las Vegas, ending a two-fight slump that threatened to derail his lightweight title hopes.
But his frustrations have spilt over, as he accused the powers-that-be back home of trying to stamp out mixed martial arts as a legitimate sport in New Zealand.
In an effort to continue his preparation during Auckland's Alert Level 4 lockdown, Hooker created a training bubble at the City Kickboxing Gym, but had to abandon his camp, after police intervened.
An attempt to move his camp to a different site was also closed down.
Hooker is one of many Kiwi sportspeople unable to secure managed isolation spots for their return to New Zealand and he also faced an anxious wait for a US visa, which delayed his arrival at Vegas until three days before the fight.
Given the circumstances - including the need to cut weight on the plane trip over - his performance was nothing short of miraculous and afterwards, Hooker doubled down on his threat to follow stablemate Israel Adesanya offshore.
"It was so much to get here, so many challenges throughout and so many people trying to prevent me from training," he says. "It was crazy.
"Having a thing at the gym to satisfy all the rules, then having the cops break that up... I had more than a dozen interactions with the police.
"They were coming round to my house, coming round to my gym... someone broke the lock on the front door of my gym, bashing it in. I had cops calling me up, saying 'if we catch you on more time, we're going to lock you up'.
"This is a big kiss-my-arse to everyone that tried to stop me."
A feature of Hooker's win was an improved grappling display, but he insists he wasn't able to work on this aspect of his gameplan, without training partners.
"I haven't grabbed a hold of someone for a month, if I'm being honest" he says. "I've been training at my house, in my garage, and going to the track with my daughter and my wife to stay fit.
"Maybe the secret to my grappling is not grappling."
Hooker claims mainstream media and NZ authorities saw the COVID-19 pandemic as a chance to drive MMA from the sporting landscape.
"I feel like the big shots in the media back home and Sport NZ, they've not liked us the whole time," he says. "I feel like they've had it out for me and Israel, but they've had to play nice, bite their tongue and give us air time.
"But as soon as they got the opportunity during this, they've not given us MIQ vouchers and gone out of their way to pursue us... and try and kill the momentum that MMA and UFC was making in New Zealand.
"But they don't count on the fact that Dan Hooker don't go nowhere - he's like a weed."
Hooker insists his decision to leave New Zealand shouldn't be taken as disrespect to his nation of birth.
"It's not to knock New Zealand in way that I'm moving away from New Zealand," he says. "I'm moving away so I can keep this damn ball rolling.
"We're still locked down and I see us locked down for another couple of months, so everyone back in New Zealand, hang tough and we'll get through it.
"It's crazy, you come over here and everyone's living life, everyone's back to normal. Around the world, people are moving on and living with it, but we look like we're still at the start - it's difficult, when I go back there and can't even train."
After his victory, Hooker called out third-ranked lightweight Beneil Dariush, as he tried to rebuild his claims on the division title.
