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Footage has re-emerged that shows Ciryl Gane and Francis Ngannou training together as teammates.
This past Saturday night, Ciryl Gane was able to extend his unbeaten pro mixed martial arts record with an efficient and confident win over Alexander Volkov.
The triumph helped to showcase exactly what he’s capable of at the elite level and, in doing so, perhaps proved that he’s just one win away from challenging for the UFC heavyweight title.
Will we see Ciryl Gane vs. Francis Ngannou?
If he does so, there’s a decent chance he could be locking horns with Francis Ngannou, with whom he used to train with back in the day at France's MMA Factory.
The footage only shows some light sparring between the two men but it does prove something that many of us already knew: Ciryl Gane is one of the few men who can serve as an intimidating physical presence for Ngannou in this division.
We aren’t suggesting that he’s got anything close to the same kind of power that Ngannou does because it wouldn’t make sense, but his technical prowess, combined with his size, would make for tough opposition to Ngannou.
Alas, as we all know, this isn’t going to be the next fight for the champ, and the same is probably going to be true for Ciryl Gane.
There are plenty of different ideas being thrown around with regards to what Ciryl Gane could do next at heavyweight, but the most obvious one in our eyes would be a showdown against Stipe Miocic.
The former champion is keeping his eyes peeled for a fight and we all know he wants to be booked in a rematch for the heavyweight title. If that doesn’t happen, though, a title eliminator against Gane would make perfect sense.
Ngannou is going to fight Derrick Lewis, with the winner of that bout likely defending the strap against Jon Jones if an agreement with the UFC is possible, so why not kill some time and form a new contender?
The land of the heavyweights is looking pretty stacked, and that’s as exciting as it gets.
