Ngannou vs Velasquez is one more great fight of Ultimate Fighting Championship. It’s the main event of UFC on ESPN 1 which will take place in Phoenix, Arizona. Both heavyweights will have a serious confrontation. Review our thoughts on this bout here below.
After over two years on the sidelines, former two-time heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez (14-2) is ready to roll again. On 17th of February at Talking Stick Resort Arena in Pheonix, he will meet a man who has bombs in his hands – Francis Ngannou (12-3). Both fighters are strong, have real knockout power, so expect fireworks. Who will be a winner? Francis Ngannou? Or it will be Cain Velasquez? All answers will be answered on the 17th of February.
Francis “The Predator” Ngannou
Ngannou is coming off of a win over Curtis Blaydes at UFC Beijing in November. This win was very important to him because “The Predator” was coming off of a disappointing decision loss to Derrick Lewis and loss to then-champion Stipe Miocic at UFC 220. After the fight with Stipe Miocic, 32-year-old heavyweight wasn’t himself and lost a lot of his confidence. He realized that he is beatable and a very disappointing loss to Lewis proved that. Despite the losses, Ngannou came back and TKO’d Curtis Blaydes just in 45 seconds. Now we know that “The Predator” is back and he is hungry as always has been for a shot at the title.
The Cameroonian-French destroyer is a very scary man. He holds the world record for hardest punch EVER thrown. Despite his insane punching power, “The Predator” is very explosive athlete has a great physique and footwork for a heavyweight. But also he has some weaknesses. His wrestling is not so good, it was shown in his fight Stipe Miocic when then-champion out-wrestled him all fight. Ngannou is very weak being on his back, he tries to stand-up all the time and doing this he is losing a lot of energy. Also, his cardio is questionable.
Cain Velasquez
Cain last fought at UFC 200, where he defeated Travis Browne in the first round by TKO. That was just a second fight in the past five years as he has been riddled with various injuries. Cain was heavyweight champion two times. He has beaten a lot of strong fighters like Brock Lesnar, Junior dos Santos. Velasquez has won five of his last six fights and he is looking forward to getting another one.
Velasquez is an elite wrestler, has a vicious ground & pound. Talking about his striking, Cain is an extremely accurate striker, have a decent striking defense. Also, he is a very active striker – fourth most significant strikes landed per minute in UFC history. Cain is an aggressive fighter, very well coached, often throws crushing leg kicks. He has very good takedown defense – stuffs 85% of attempts. In addition, Velasquez has great cardio and wears down opponents with his extreme pace & strength. However, the 36 years old heavyweight has some weaknesses. His height & reach is below average for the weight class, he can be knocked out, also can be too aggressive.
H2H
These fighters never met each other in the octagon.