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Francis Ngannou shocked the world on Saturday, knocking down Tyson Fury but ultimately losing a razor thin split decision against the lineal heavyweight boxing champion.
The official judges’ scores were 95-94 Ngannou, and 96-93, 95-94 both for Fury. Like with most big fights that go to a decision, a lot of people were unsurprisingly debating the scores and pouring out hot takes on social media afterwards. While the fight was close and competitive, several world champions and legends from both boxing and MMA believe that Francis Ngannou was the one who should’ve gotten his hand raised.
Francis Ngannou believes he won the fight against Tyson Fury
Several boxing legends think Francis Ngannou beat Tyson Fury
“Tyson lose,” Roberto Duran said ringside, when asked about his thoughts.
Chris Eubank Jr. also believes Ngannou should’ve gotten the nod.
Mike Tyson, who Saudi Arabia paid to “coach” Francis Ngannou, says he also scored it for the UFC champion. “No, it wasn’t a robbery, but everybody knows the outcome.”
Rival boxing promoter Eddie Hearn, who isn’t exactly unbiased either, says a “complete novice” beat Fury and “thought Ngannou won by two rounds.”
āYou have one guy who never boxed before fighting another guy who also looked like he never boxed before,ā Hearn told DAZN while promoting a Matchroom Boxing show in Mexico. āA complete novice, in everybody’s book, just beat Tyson Fury. Ngannou won that fight. He dropped him, and they did very little at the back end of the fight.
āI watched it back, didnāt even look like a big shot.” Hearn said. “I donāt know if his resistance is gone.ā
Promoter Lou DiBella thought tonight was embarrassing for boxing.
Lennox Lewis didn’t explicitly weigh in on the decision, but called it a “lackluster win.”
Several other boxing champions such as Claressa Shields and Sunny Edwards thought Ngannou might have done enough to win the decision.
Ricky Hatton was the only boxing star I could find on social media that thought Fury won.
UFC stars weigh in on the decision
A few MMA legends also weighed in, thinking Ngannou won. Nate Diaz also took a dig at the “biased” boxing commentators.
Former UFC heavyweight champion Junior dos Santos argued that his former opponent in Ngannou landed the best shots of the evening.
“I don’t know how they saw that result. Francis won that fight,” he said. “I don’t know how those guys saw something different than that. It’s not amateur boxing! It’s not Olympic boxing, it’s professional boxing! The most effective punches count more, and the good punches come from Francis. Tyson Fury was only touching him and avoiding the fight!”
Longtime UFC champion Demetrious Johnson said Francis was “robbed,” and thought “the judges were blind” in his live reaction to the fight. Interestingly enough, Mighty Mouse also correctly predicted that Ngannou could score a knockdown, but the count after would save Fury from being finished.
Other MMA stars such as Chris Weidman, Ben Rothwell and Marvin Vettori weighed in and thought their UFC colleague should’ve won.
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