ESPN’s Brett Okamoto sits down with Francis Ngannou in his locker room after making his pro boxing debut vs. Tyson Fury in …
Brett okamoto alongside Francis nanu backstage after a hardfought 10 round boxing match with the best heavyweight boxer in the world right now Tyson Fury you made your professional boxing debut Francis and I feel like you you left a lot of people speechless tonight I mean I I feel like I’m one of them watching that fight was remarkable did it surprise you at all anything about that fight surprise you oh the fact that I didn’t win surprise me I came here tonight to win um I I’m going back without that Victory which is not what I was uh I was looking forward I was really really looking forward to win this fight but I do uh learn a lot tonight about the sport you know this really my first time um to fight and uh to do like 10 round boxing match straight boxing and uh you know I can tell myself that I didn’t do bad against the the number one uh heavyweight in the world so um I’m I just going to go back and focus on that and have at least that experience to work on it um that feeling to work with it um and get prepared for the next time because um I think this just get me even more excited and hungry to to prove you know I um I was wounded but I realized that I can bite you told me before this fight it was a long time ago it was uh I think it was when you were like rehabbing your knee it’s actually the day like I brought my son over there remember that and you told me um I’m definitely going back to MMA I uh I I I I’m I’m I’m just learning I’m finding my groove in MMA I’m I’m I’m being able to do whatever I want in MMA but then I listen to you talk about boxing and it’s like I learned a lot from this I want to go and I want to learn more about this where where is your head at in terms of are you a boxer or mixed martial artist combination I can do both nothing stop me from doing both uh if if I have the skill for both of them why not um as for right now I have a uh deal with PF and I’m intending to fight uh MMA again I love it I’m more com not like I’m more more comfortable but I still love it um and um I’m going to I might do some MMA fight but I’m still going to do boxing like I never intend to just step over and do one fight and go go out that wasn’t the plan at all Never So the plan is still the same can you just talk about the night I mean wherever you want to go with it from the walk out to the knockdown to just trying to stay focused and and what you were hearing from your corner throughout I mean what stands out to you about this night when you kind of relive it real quickly in your head he was a big night it was a impressive night um great people around Big Show uh more than I’ve ever seen I think is the biggest show in the combat sport so far that I haven’t seen uh I never see so much much uh concentration of U legend in the same place and uh just being a fany I was little Fanboy in there looking here and see uh see these guy see Luis Figo see everybody and you know you get a little excited but of course when the fight starts it’s the fight when is the fight is the fight nothing else you know you get FOC out get focus on the fight when you knocked him down you did a little dance over him or you wanted him a little bit do you even remember that yes well because when we started he said uh let’s go to school so I’m like oh I think you a you’re a bad teacher did you uh did you sense or or how quickly did you sense a change in his attitude towards you that maybe he thought it was going to go a certain way and it wasn’t going that way I knew he’s going to be like that I know like everybody uh that doubted my uh ability to box it’s going to be like that you know um I realized I I I feel the fight over as he was going um and his attitude was changing basically when I was changing to south paw he wasn’t doing anything like uh when I want to rest I just I switch to sou like he he not doing anything he can do so I realized that he was having a struggle right there at that moment and in the CLE I have my right hand uh my left my left hand can go pretty pretty good but I was I wasn’t in my best I was slowing down already I wasn’t in my best uh speed and um I think was the fifth or the sixth round I kind of like get him in that round but I didn’t want to go crazy because I don’t want to want to put too much power the the focus in this fight was like not to put Power you know to fight just focus on fighting not go there uh put energy on everything and gas out like just fight and then if he The Knockout comes he comes if not then we fight to the decision so that was the plan I think a lot of people I mean the Tim Tim Bradley the you know the the former boxing world champion who was analyzing the fight uh you he was in the fighter meeting you know Tim Bradley he was saying how do you get this good at boxing in four months did you get this good in boxing in four months or were you just like you had a lot of these skills from prior I get no wasn’t in four in four months I started boxing even before MMA I just leted boxing and uh step into MMA and then like over the time I I had to adjust my boxing to MMA he was he was hard and I think it’s still hard I still does I still don’t have that space it’s hard for me to push I’m still working on like the job to push that job clearly you know um to get that reflex back that uh momentum I haven’t bu it yet uh and that’s why like I’m so confident because I know that in a couple month keep working in into those stuff um again I have a lot of uh uh room to improve in those space and I’m very confident about it you had a couple uh open workouts before this fight and uh an overwhelming observation from those open workouts where that Francis doesn’t look very good hitting the pads that’s what a lot of people were saying and now a lot of people want to know were you faking were you being bad on purpose when you were ining those pads no I mean uh whatever I would have done in that open workout people would have said the same thing people was coming to criticize I was in the spot that no matter what I do or no matter how I look people was were going to criticize that wasn’t the point at all and I knew that I knew already what was going on uh he was about like okay how to shut Frances down how to criticize Frances even when you if you do something good they turn it down people go to open work out they don’t even work out you know they dance bad they do everything they don’t work out so like why would that be a problem if somebody look good I’m not there to prove something we don’t have a jurge in the open workout open workout is not a proof of performance it’s just like you know giving some action entertaining you know some people just come and decide to dance instead of like hit meats or do something you guys are both Fighters you and Tyson you know you you’ve you’ve fought hundreds of times in the gym and then and and on under the brightest of Lights I feel like from the outside I would think that after a fight you would both know who won like when that fight was over who did you feel had won and if if he’s being honest who do you think he would say if he being honest he would say I won that fight I want that fight there’s not a question about it but you know um and even before getting here I knew I know like if this fight get to to decision I’m not winning not because I didn’t do good because I’m a new guy in the house I come here and I just want to you know kick into people business I know they need there’s a structural business out there and you need to do a lot to to destroy that’s why he would have be upset for them I wasn’t expecting to just win like that in decision into decision but you know it is what it is I do my job um I know that I did everything that I could have done I did my best maybe next time I should just do better to convince people more and last question for me is how how frequently can you do this I mean you say you want to now compete in two sports that’s very very difficult to do how what do you think the plan is moving forward in terms of how many times you fight per year in in in in a ring or in a cage I’m really going to fight sometime in February or March um might be in the c or in the ring but I’m going to fight I already have a basically like have both and we are working on like what’s going to work better I think anybody will doubt you ever again like tonight’s tonight’s the end of it doubter is a doubter they mean to doubt doesn’t matter what happened they’re going to doubt so don’t focus on doubter focus on the believe the believing focus on yourself believing um on yourself instead of focus on the people around people always doubt and uh that’s not the question some people doubt some people hate some people they are meant to do this those stuff it’s like snake they mean to bite and then you you are meant to do what you do you do your and they do that I can’t do anything about that well you’re doing your man and it’s been very very fun to watch and I uh congratulate you man it was really really fun to watch you thank thank you for the time as always [Music] apprciate