Has PFL Africa Arrived?

The PFL’s global expansion has been something worth watching especially as they are one of the few promotions that is delivering on their commitment – by bringing an event to Africa. 

The month of July will bear witness as the Grand West Arena in Cape Town will host the first round of the 2025 PFL Africa Tournament – featuring eight-man brackets in the heavyweight and bantamweight divisions – along with some of PFL’s top roster athletes in a stacked Champions Series card.

But that’s where it ends……the Africa hype anyway!

Let me explain.

When PFL Europe launched – back on March 2023 – it had a 10-fight card that consisted EXCLUSIVELY of European fighters. Not a single fighter was from any other continent other than Europe!

On July 19, PFL Africa will not be the headline. In fact, it will serve as the undercard to the PFL Champions Series, an event billed as PFL Cape Town. Why is that?

• Now the first argument will be that it is PFL Africa’s iaugural event. If so, why then was PFL Europe able to pull together twenty European fighters?
• Maybe it’s because we are still developing our talent here in Africa? If so, when one compares the fight records of the PFL Europe fighters to those on the PFL Africa card, only five of the European fighters had 10-fights or more on their record while three of the African fighters have 10-fights or more. But that is also deceiving because the PFL Africa undercard has at least four fighters who represent countries other than those in Africa, namely; Badr Medkouri (8-2) from France*, Abraham Bably (5-2) from England/Ireland*, Karim Henniene (4-0) from Canada* and Mickael Groguhe (6-2) from France/Ireland*. What makes it worse is that Bably will face Medkouri in the only non-African bout on the PFL Africa card. They cannot even find eighteen African fighters for a PFL Africa card!
• Finally, the Head of Fighter Operations for PFL Europe, Dan Hardy, was seen scouring the continent for promotional talent, looking to make Europe fertile ground for continental domination. Has anyone seen PFL Africa Chairman, Francis Ngannou, scouring the African continent for fighter talent? Nope. He has represented the PFL once (in the cage) since leaving the UFC in January 2023 and seems content to focus on building his floundering boxing career (0-2). 

If we are being honest about this, we will acknowledge that Africa is just an open space on the global combat sports chess board. Other than the born-and-built promotions like the EFC out of South Africa, AKO out of Nigeria and a few smaller, newer ones, Brave CF were the first movers having, to date, hosted four events on African soil. ARES was slated to make their African appearance but COVID put paid to those plans. The UFC have been promising for far too long, despite there having been multiple African-born champions and the promotion having a current champion from South Africa.

When will Africa finally get it’s flowers? They all talk so dreamily about the African continent but when it really matters, we see their true game. Africa is topical! Africa serves a purpose! Africa helps drive their narrative! Africa is not their priority!

For those interested in the upcoming PFL Cape Town event on Saturday, July 19;

PFL Champions Series – 8:30 PM SAST / 2:30 PM EST

Middleweight Title Fight Main Event: Johnny Eblen (16-0) vs. Costello van Steenis (16-3)

Women’s Flyweight Co-Main Event: Dakota Ditcheva (14-0) vs. Sumiko Inaba (8-1)

Featherweight Showcase Bout: AJ McKee (22-2) vs. Akhmed Magomedov (11-1)

Lightweight Showcase Bout: Artur Zaynukov (16-4) vs. Takeshi Izumi (6-3)

Heavyweight Showcase Bout: Corey Anderson (18-6) vs. Denis Goltsov (36-8)

PFL Africa Tournament – 4:30 PM SAST / 10:30 AM EST

Bantamweight First Round Bout: Nkosi Ndebele (8-3) vs. Mahmoud Atef (5-2)

Heavyweight First Round Bout: Maxwell Djantou Nana (6-1) vs. Mikael Groguhe (6-2)

Bantamweight First Round Bout: Shannon Van Tonder (7-2) vs. Boule Godogo (3-0)

Heavyweight First Round Bout: Jashell Ticha Awa (3-1) vs. Justin Clarke (2-0)

Bantamweight First Round Bout: Antero Dos Santos (5-0) vs. Karim Henniene (4-0)

Heavyweight First Round Bout: Abdoullah Kane (3-0) vs. Mohammed Ben Yahia (9-4)

Bantamweight First Round Bout: Simbarashe Hokonya (5-0) vs. Alain Majorique (5-0)

Heavyweight First Round Bout: Abraham Bably (5-2) vs. Badredinne Medkouri (8-2)

Showcase Women’s Strawweight Bout: Juliet Ukah (6-0) vs. Ceileigh Niedermayr (3-2)

* Fighter origins differ between what the promotion shows and what is available on Tapology.