With its popularity have come questions about its safety.

Some believe dambe is too dangerous in any form. Split brows, broken noses, smashed teeth and knockouts are common. The destruction is written in scars on the faces of fighters who have spent years in the ring.

“It’s too brutal,” Femi Babafemi, an amateur boxing coach, said. “Those that are doing it are really endangering their lives.”

Still, dambe has become a full-time job for many fighters. Fans, ring owners and wealthy patrons support their favorite fighters. One established boxer, Auta Nafiu Abdullah, who has fought for seven years, said he earned, on average, about 100,000 Nigerian naira, or about $275, a month.

The fights are frenetic and perilous.

Boxers gather in fighting clans around a sand pit, taunting rivals and breaking suddenly into combat. Today, they head-butt and kick as well as punch. All the while, singers and drummers play mesmeric songs to embolden fighters.

Bello, who started watching dambe 40 years ago, said he started the league in 2017 with fellow enthusiasts because he had grown fed up with what he saw as the declining quality of the sport.