New Zealand may be able to keep its biggest mixed martial artists Israel Adesanya and Dan Hooker, City Kickboxing coach Eugene Bareman says.
With the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects on international travel looking to carry on into a third year in 2022, City Kickboxing have been hampered by the difficulties in leaving and returning to New Zealand perhaps more than any other sporting team.
With the managed isolation quarantine system (MIQ) flooded by Kiwis looking to return home, City Kickboxing's stable of fighters have been forced to miss out on potentially career defining bouts due to being unable to secure spaces for their return.
Those MIQ headaches, and general struggles with the pandemic altogether, have seen City Kickboxing looking to relocate outside of New Zealand, with Bareman telling Newshub that he's already looking into potential destinations that the team could relocate to.
The MIQ space situation has been incredibly frustrating - not just for Bareman - with the system appearing to favour certain sporting codes over others.
The All Blacks have had no such issues securing their spots for the Rugby Championship in 2020, and the same again in 2021 with their end of year tour.
Elsewhere, the Blackcaps were also able to secure space to travel to and from England for the World Test Championship final victory against India, as well as being afforded emergency spaces after fleeing their cancelled tour of Pakistan due to a security threat.
But with neither rugby nor cricket holding the same global reach as the UFC, Bareman insists that his team should at the very least be afforded the same rights. And with the situation seemingly unlikely to change, City Kickboxing could have no choice but to leave New Zealand until a resolution can be reached.
"I believe that we're just as important to the country as the rugby team, a lot of people aren't going to like me saying that," he tells Newshub. "We should be eligible for the same benefits as them.
"I don't like bringing the All Blacks up - it's nothing against the All Blacks, it's just that they're the best example to use at the moment.
"We don't want to leave the country, that has to be very clear. Our number one choice is to come to some sort of resolution where we don't have to leave our country, where we don't have to leave our team and our loved ones, where we can keep developing the sport, where we can keep bringing economic benefit into the country through what we do.
"Our number one choice is to stay in the country and work to a resolution to do that."
One solution could be a change in determining as to what constitutes needing MIQ. At present, all returnees must go through the system, regardless of what country they're returning from and its COVID situation.
And while City Kickboxing's team are fully prepared to go through MIQ when needed, the change in system to potentially allow for home quarantines could be revolutionary.
"These sort of pilot programmes will go a long way. People need to understand, we're not asking to be quarantine free. We will happily do the quarantine.
"We're more than happy to quarantine if it keeps the country safe.
"What we're talking about is we need to be able to flow freely in and out of the country to participate in our sport and in our business.
"If quarantining at home is the answer, that'll be great.
"The problem is that our government at the moment has moved so slowly at everything they've done across the board.
"It's taken you all this time to bring in this pilot programme, when is that going to be instituted? August? September? November next year? We may as well have moved overseas by then.
"There's still a lot of questions that have to be asked, but it's a step in the right direction for some of the smaller sports teams, and individual sportsmen like us.
"Hopefully it comes through, and hopefully they can institute it really fast."
Israel Adesanya has already stated that he will relocate to the US, while Dan Hooker has hinted at the same.
But that need not be the case, as Bareman says that the pair will do what the rest of the City Kickboxing team do.
"Israel Adesanya and people like Dan Hooker, take them for what they are. They're young, aspiring athletes in the prime of their career that they've had sucked away from them for a year, and then another year on top of that, as the government seem to be refusing to improve the situation.
"They're emotional, they're young, and one thing I know about those guys is they'll do what the team does.
"If the team stays, those guys stay. If the team goes, those guys go.
"They know that."
