Dana White was not surprised to watch Anthony Joshua destroy Francis Ngannou, which is one of the reasons he never wants to see MMA fighters transition to boxing.
Just one day before UFC 299 in Miami, Ngannou lost a nasty knockout against Joshua. The former UFC champion was knocked down twice before being finished off with a last right hand.
The battle ended radically differently than Ngannou’s first boxing match, in which he knocked down lineal heavyweight champion Tyson Fury and eventually defeated him by a razor-thin decision.
This time, Ngannou appeared outmatched as Joshua defeated him in the first round and then again in the second round. After Ngannou recovered from the second knockdown, Joshua raced forward with a stunning overhand right that put the former UFC heavyweight champion to sleep before he ever struck the mat.
“I saw it on social media,” White stated of the knockout. “Going into the Fury fight, if Fury trained for the fight and didn’t show up and look like he ate Tyson Fury, that’s probably the way that fight would have ended, too.”
This ringside angle of @anthonyjoshua's finish is SAVAGE ☠️#JoshuaNgannou | #KnockoutChaos | #RiyadhSeason pic.twitter.com/YJYV8hPmmD
— DAZN Boxing (@DAZNBoxing) March 9, 2024
Ngannou’s performance against Fury helped him land the fight with Joshua, but the two fights played out quite differently.
When he was still in the UFC, Ngannou frequently mentioned a fight with Fury, which may have influenced his decision to leave the promotion. It worked out in the end, as he nearly defeated Fury, but the same could not be said about his performance versus Joshua.
White stated that watching Ngannou be flattened with one of the most brutal knockouts in recent history exemplifies why he never liked these crossover matchups in the first place.
“You know how I feel about crossovers into boxing,” White went on to say. “That is how they end. “Exactly like that.”
Regardless of how White feels, Ngannou has stated that he intends to return to boxing, though it is unclear whether that will be his next fight or if he will finally make his debut with the PFL after signing a lucrative contract with the upstart promotion following his departure from the UFC.
