Johnny Eblen survives second round onslaught, defeats Impa Kasanganay in PFL vs Bellator co-main event

We’ve got a big day of fights coming to us today, February 24, 2023, where PFL vs Bellator came to us live from the Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, just before The Ultimate Fighting Championship returns to us for UFC Mexico City later in the evening.

Headlining PFL vs Bellator is a heavyweight affair between 2023 PFL heavyweight champion Renan Ferreira (12-3, 3 NC) and Bellator heavyweight champion Ryan Bader (31-7, 1 NC).

Co-headlining the bout was a middleweight showdown between 2023 PFL light-heavyweight champion Impa Kasanganay (15-4) and Bellator middleweight champion Johnny Eblen (15-0).

Following his departure from the UFC Kasanganay would lose his Eagle FC debut via split decision, before winning his last six-straight, including his claim of PFL’s light-heavyweight championship this past November.

Eblen on the other hand has been dominant as anyone in recent memory, winning the Bellator middleweight championship against Gegard Mousasi in June of 2022 before defending it against the likes of Anatoly Tokov and Fabian Edwards over the course of his last two fights.

Continue reading to see how our co-main event of the evening went down:

Official Result: Johnny Eblen def. Impa Kasanganay via split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)

Eblen secures an early single leg takedown, Kasanganay getting right back to his feet before Eblen presses him into the fence in search of another. Eventually Kasanganay separates and gets to work with his boxing, landing a few good shots to the face of Eblen.

Kasanganay has a very strong start to round two, hurting Eblen on the feet with nasty combinations in bunches. He continued throwing for the opening two minutes of the round, hurting Eblen worse and worse with each punch landed before Eblen is eventually able to tie up with him.

Eblen gets him back down and takes his back, before Kasanganay escapes and ends the round on bottom with Eblen in his guard.

Eblen has a good third and final round, getting some combinations of his own going before securing another takedown where he ended the fight with a body triangle around Kasanganay’s back.

After as competitive as this fight was, it’s a wonder why they didn’t make it five rounds. Both of these men were active champions going into this champ versus champ fight, and each have gone five rounds before.

Nonetheless,

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Brady Ordway

I became a fan of combat sports when I was 12 years old. I was scrolling through the channels and landed upon Versus, where WEC was televised. Urijah Faber fought Jens Pulver for the second time that night. That's the first fight I ever saw, and I was immediately hooked. So eventually, I began covering the sport in the fourth quarter of 2018, and have since started writing about animals as well. If you'd like to see those pieces, be sure to check out learnaboutnature.com!

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