The longest World Title reign in ONE Championship history came to an end in the Singapore Indoor Stadium as Kevin “The Silencer” Belingon defeated Bibiano “The Flash” Fernandes in a thrilling five-round battle.
The Filipino from the famed Team Lakay in Baguio City had to draw on every ounce of resilience he had at ONE: HEART OF THE LION on Friday, 9 November to push through some close submission attempts from the ONE Bantamweight World Champion, but he managed to escape every time.
The momentum went back and forth, but Fernandes took the ONE Interim Bantamweight World Champion down several times and seemed to have the edge heading into the final two rounds.
However, the defending titleholder was dropped by a right hand in the fourth frame, and Belingon continued to attack until the finish. It came by the narrowest of margins, but he handed Fernandes his first defeat in eight years to become the new, undisputed ONE Bantamweight World Champion.
The Singaporean crowd’s cheers were never louder than when they were cheering for featherweight contender Christian “The Warrior” Lee, who blew Kazuki Tokudome away at the 3:07 mark of the first round.
The hometown hero got his Japanese opponent to the ground and fired away with punches to score a TKO stoppage in this 73-kilogram catch weight contest, raise his record to 10-3, and get back in the hunt for a World Title.
Giorgio “The Doctor” Petrosyan put on another striking clinic to move to 98-2-2 (1 NC) in his kickboxing career at the end of a 71-kilogram catch weight ONE Super Series clash.
The Italian-Armenian was almost flawless as he slipped Sorgraw Petchyindee Academy’s punches and walked through his kicks to blast him with precise power-punching combinations. Almost every strike seemed to score a direct hit, for a clear unanimous decision.
Tiffany “No Chill” Teo picked up the biggest win of her career when all three judges awarded her a decision against Michelle Nicolini after their strawweight contest.
The hometown hero had to survive some scary submission attempts from the eight-time BJJ world champion, but grew in confidence and started to let her strikes go as the bout went on. A dominant final round sealed the eighth win of her career against just one loss.
After more than three years without a victory, Adrian “The Hunter” Pang returned to the win column in the lightweight division with a TKO of Japan’s Kota “Kong” Shimoishi.
The Australian was taken down early, but once he got on top of his opponent, he attacked relentlessly until the end of the round. Before the second stanza began, the cageside doctor called a halt to the contest because of damage to Shimoishi, improving Pang’s record to 23-12-2.
“Smokin” Jo Nattawut unleashed his powerful strikes to overwhelm George Mann at the end of a competitive contest to add a win to his 68-7-2 Muay Thai slate.
The tall Scottish featherweight used his range to frustrate the Thai star at times in the first two rounds, but Nattawut had more and more success as the contest progressed. He landed hard and often in the final round to come within a whisker of a knockout and seal a unanimous decision win.
The main card kicked off with the fastest knockout in ONE Super Series from Alaverdi “Dagger” Ramazanov.
The Russian Muay Thai bantamweight stopped Scotland’s Andrew “Maddog Fairtex” Miller after 57 seconds thanks to a clean uppercut. It was his second victory in the world’s largest martial arts organization in little more than a month, and it improved his record to 59-3.
