Francis Ngannou has been able to overcome incredible adversity in his life and career and that was no different in his PFL debut.
For many, returning to MMA after such a long time away to face a dangerous and confident opponent in Renan Ferreira would have been a massive task.
As he showed at PFL's Battle Of The Giants in Riyadh, this was the least of Ngannou's troubles after the year he has been through.
Alongside a tough knockout defeat in boxing to Anthony Joshua, the former UFC heavyweight champion suffered a tragic loss earlier this year when his son unexpectedly passed away.
After stopping Ferreira in the first round by securing a takedown and unleashing some thunderous ground and pound, Ngannou was overcome by emotion in his post-fight interview:
"I don't know, I just can't think about anything than my son, Kobe. I only take this fight because of him, I wanted to fight for him one more time and I'm done, so I don't know. I hope they can remember his name because without Kobe, we wouldn't be here tonight. I wouldn't have fight but thank you everyone for coming."
Ngannou kept his composure on fight week but that doesn't mean that returning to MMA in order to honour his son wasn't an incredibly difficult experience for him:
"It was tough, it's been tough the past, I think not only the training camp was tough but the past two days were very tough, full of emotion. Couldn't do anything without thinking about it. I'm trying to say I was being strong, tell myself everything to keep moving but it's hard man, it's just hard."
Despite the dangers that Ferreira could present Ngannou, the fight itself was relatively straight forward for "The Predator" aside from one triangle attempt.
We haven't seen him since he successfully defended the UFC heavyweight title against Ciryl Gane but the heavyweight king was confident that he'd be able to pick up from where he left off:
"I knew I didn't miss a step, I wasn't worried about it because as soon as I walk in the gym for MMA, I knew that everything was still there. It was just about me being able to manage my emotion, deal with life, not have to mix up stuff, so that's basically what it was about. I've been working and yes, we're here."
Watch the full interview below:
