Francis Ngannou was born and raised in the village of Batié, Cameroon. He lived in poverty and had little formal education growing up.
Ngannou’s parents divorced when he was six years old, and he was sent to live with his aunt. At 10 years old, Ngannou started working in a sand quarry in Batié because of a lack of funds.
He did various odd jobs to make ends meet, until age 26 when he decided to head to Paris, France, to pursue professional boxing. However upon reaching Europe, he was jailed for two months in Spain for illegally crossing the border.
After Ngannou reached Paris, he had no money, no friends, and no place to live. After living homeless on the streets of Paris, he met Francis Carmont who introduced him to Fernand Lopez and the MMA factory. Being a fan of Mike Tyson, Ngannou was originally interested in learning how to box but Lopez saw his potential in MMA and convinced him to try MMA instead.
He fought his way to the top of the UFC and earned $600,000 payout in his last biggest fight in the MMA league. He finally had to break with his employers because they weren’t willing to pay him what he felt was his due and didnt accept his request to try professional boxing which pays better. They fell out badly with him and made him a final offer at the latter stages.
The UFC finally agreed to offer Ngannou a massive $8million contract offer to fight Jon Jones, which would have been one of the top fights in the league. Suprisingly he turned it down earlier this year and called it a “trick” until he became a free agent till luck struck.
Ngannou signed a deal with Professional Fighterd League (PFL) and he was given the freedom to pursue a boxing match on his own terms but he gets equity in the company, a seat on the PFL’s athlete advisory board and he also became the chairman of PFL Africa.
And he fights Tyson Fury tomorrow, the British professional boxer who holds the World Boxing Council (WBC) heavyweight title since 2020. And he makes over $10m in just his first fight tried professional boxing.
He has Mike Tyson training him, and the like of C. Ronaldo celebrating his exploits and determination. I don’t know what other better story to motivate anyone today…..
But Francis N’Gannou is already a Legend Getting Started.
