Francis Ngannou prepares for his fight against Stipe Miocic in their Heavyweight Championship fight during UFC 220 at TD Garden on January 20, 2018 in Boston, Massachusetts. (Photo by Mike Lawrie/Getty Images)
UFC heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou was in awe of Stevie Ray’s extraordinary submission of Anthony Pettis
MMA fighter Stevie Ray pocketed a huge win earlier today, when he submitted former UFC lightweight champion Anthony Pettis through an unwonted submission. The submission had the Twitter community flabbergasted, as they raved about it online.
Pettis was the better fighter in the first round, using his fluid movements, and experience to stupefy his opponent. The UFC veteran landed a slick question mark kick and started to tee off on his opponents with his wide array of attacks. Ray reversed a Pettis takedown attempt, immediately taking his back, and working positions for a submission. Although Pettis nearly scrambled free, Ray locked in a very unusual body triangle from an awkward angle and twisted the torso of his opponent for the stunning finish at the 2:57 mark of Round 2.
UFC heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou was amongst the first to react to the wild submission, and wrote on Twitter, ‘ What’s the name of this submission? 🤔’
Francis Ngannou and the UFC top brass have been at loggerheads over a pay dispute and certain terms in his contract. The Predator had even gone out on a limb claiming that he wants a move away from the UFC to boxing. Currently, he is sidelined with a knee injury that will keep him out of action for this year entirely.
Ngannou dug deep to overcome some adversity in his last fight and first title defense against the crafty Ciryl Gane. But that victory came at a cost, and the apex predator is sidelined for the entire year, while talks of an interim championship are gaining momentum.
It was also being discussed that Ngannou might not stick around and make a potential-jump to boxing, while clouds of uncertainty loomed over his UFC career.
A fan wrote on a Twitter thread earlier yesterday suggesting that we might never see Francis fight again. Ngannou replied to the tweet by affirming that he’s far from done, and has at least five more years of fighting left. Besides that, he also used the three kings hashtag, popularly coined for the three ruling dominant African champions- Kamaru Usman, Israel Adesanya, and Francis himself.
He wrote, ‘I’m just getting started bro ! I have at least 5 more years to conquer everything. #3KINGS’
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