One of the biggest names absent from the CJI 2 European Trials this year was top UK competitor Eoghan O’Flanagan, but the man behind the promotion has now revealed exactly why he was left out. The competition for spots in the tournament was always going to be fierce, as there were only four men in every weight class. At O’Flanagan’s size, he would most likely have competed in the under 88kg division, as that is where he made his superb run at ADCC 2022. He would probably have been the favorite in that bracket too, as only two of the men in it had been to ADCC before and O’Flanagan made it further than both of them.
Jones revealed that the original reason he was given for Eoghan O’Flanagan not being in the CJI 2 European trials was that he had a scheduling conflict:
“Well, he did say he had a seminar booked for that time period. I believe it was in Belgium, but he was able to show up to the event and I was able to get him drunk and make sure he missed his flight. So, he could have competed. There was no conflict of interest there.”
It was a huge opportunity that O’Flanagan passed up too, because a place on the Craig Jones Invitational 2 roster means a shot at a share of the million-dollar prize, or $200,000. That’s when Jones dropped the bombshell that it wasn’t just a scheduling conflict, O’Flanagan apparently also wanted to be compensated for his time in the qualifying tournament too:
“Eoghan (O’Flanagan) wanted to be fairly compensated to compete against these two guys in the tournament and we really didn’t have the budget to stretch to include him to get the compensation he feels he deserves. So that was really what held us back there. Obviously would have been lovely to have Eoghan in the event, but couldn’t do it. Couldn’t afford it.”
The full interview with Craig Jones where he explains why Eoghan O’Flanagan didn’t compete in the CJI 2 trials was uploaded to the official YouTube channel of B-Team Jiu-Jitsu:
