It took Francis Ngannou simply three and a half minutes to dispatch Rennan Ferreira in the primary occasion of PFL’s “Battle of the Giants” pay-per-view.

The previous UFC heavyweight champ took down the PFL champ one minute into the primary spherical, surviving a triangle try earlier than battering Ferreira with relentless floor and pound for a KO win. Watch the end right here. After the victory, he remained on the canvas for a number of moments, overwhelmed by the second and feelings he was feeling.

There was loads of sorrow blended in with Ngannou’s post-fight celebration. “The Predator” had misplaced his 15-month-old son Kobe in April as a consequence of a “deadly malformation on his mind.” To compete at that stage simply six months later, in one of the essential matches of his profession, was spectacular. Not even Ngannou was positive he may do it.

“I was — I imply, they’ve been telling me that I’m robust to the purpose that I get to consider that I’m robust,” he mentioned on the PFL post-fight press convention. “After which I not too long ago simply discover out that I wasn’t robust. I wasn’t that robust, you understand?”

“Life can allow you to take an advance and suppose you’re operating away, after which it hits you actually dangerous, like from the entrance,” Ngannou added. “After which, it’s one thing that I by no means imagined. I seen individuals going by way of it and I’d tried to grasp the way it feels, out of compassion, however by no means acquired near the way it felt precisely.”

“It was fairly onerous. It was onerous at any second, from the start to the tip, however I feel it’s a type of issues that you simply form of ask your self, ‘Is that this gonna ever be over?’ And also you suppose it would by no means be over. You may as nicely learn to roll with it, to reside with it. In sure instances, I might have taken time, you understand, to grieve. However how lengthy would that take?”

“I don’t suppose there’s sufficient time for me to try this,” he concluded. “I don’t suppose a lifetime could be sufficient, to grieve. So it was nearly, like, preserve going, you understand? It’s a brand new life, a brand new way of life that I’ve to be taught.”

Ngannou’s description of the second he gained was heartbreaking.

“Okay, it’s over, and it’s performed,” he recalled. “I did what I got here right here to do. And, yeah, I’ve to return into my actuality, you understand, to face it.”

The Cameroonian fighter admitted to having severe doubts about his means to combat on the highest stage in opposition to Ferreira.

“He was my greatest problem in that I wasn’t the individual that I was, coming into this combat,” he mentioned. “This combat for me was additionally a solution to discover out if I nonetheless have it, one thing like that. If I can deal take care of the strain, with the 5 week [training camp], with media, and all the pieces. And, yeah, we acquired by way of.”

Ngannou’s final phrases earlier than departing the press convention had been inspirational however grounded.

“Sure, he was onerous. He was very onerous,” Ngannou mentioned. “However, you understand, life is all the time onerous. Nothing in life comes straightforward. All the things is gonna be onerous, and also you’re gonna give what it takes to get what you need, should you really need it.”