Francis Ngannou, considered the lineal heavyweight champion in MMA, returned to the sport for his first MMA action since 2022 and defeated Brazil's Renan Ferreira in the first round to win the PFL heavyweight championship. Ngannou has a powerful story that saw him flee Cameroon to pursue a career in boxing. Fernand Lopez, however, convinced him to give MMA a try. That decision proved to be worthwhile, as he becamew the UFC heavyweight champion. After leaving the UFC organization, Ngannou went on to compete in a pair of boxing fights after signing with PFL. Though he lost to both Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua, he managed to drop Fury, the then-WBC heavyweight champion. On Saturday, Ngannou returned to MMA for the first time since January 2022, now with UFC's rival, the PFL (Professional Fighters League). He was matched against Ferreira, who reached the top of the PFL in the 2023 season. After a no-contest against Rizvan Kuniev, Ferreira defeated Matheus Scheffel, Maurice Greene and Denis Goltsov – knocking out all three – to win the 2023 PFL Heavyweight Championship. Then, Ferreira earned the opportunity to fight Ngannou with a first-round knockout of Bellator heavyweight champion Ryan Bader in under a minute. Here is PFL's account of how Saturday's Ngannou-Ferreira fight played out:

 

Round 1

 

The two meet in the center. Low kick from Ngannou. A low kick from Ferreira. Leg kick from Ngannou. Low kick from Ngannou, and Ferreira narrowly misses a left hand. Strong right hand from Ngannou. Ngannou shoots in and scores a takedown. Short left hand from Ngannou. Ngannou looking to do work. Ferreira suddenly throws up his legs for a triangle choke attempt! Ngannou gets his head out as the referee warns Ferreira for having his toes in the fence. Ngannou does work with the left hand. Ngannou postures up with ground-and-pound! Ferreira goes to his stomach and covers up. Ngannou positioning himself, and he gets back to the flurry of shots! Ferreira is out! The fight is over!