Yodsanan Sityodtong Wins At ONE Fighting Championship

[webfact]

Yodsanan Sityodtong wins at ONE Fighting Championship

Photo: Shafudin Jaya

Thai fighter Yodsanan Sityodtong made his mixed martial arts (MMA) debut in Singapore on Saturday night scoring a spectacular knock out in his fight for ONE Fighting Championship.

One FC is a brand new MMA promotion but the event got off to the best possible start with ten action packed fights in front of a full house at the Singapore Indoor Stadium. Yodsanan’s fight was one of the highlights of the night as he finished South African Muay Thai champion Daniel Mashamaite with a devastating knee to the temple early in the second round.

Yodsanan is originally from Sisaket but is now based in Singapore and fights out of Evolve MMA. He has been working hard on his ground game and demonstrated that he has become much more than a boxer by taking Mashamaite down, to the amazement of the commentators, and looking to secure a submission.

In the end it was Yodsanan’s punching power, which saw him knock out 47 opponents as a professional boxer, made the difference. It took the Thai fighter a few minutes to acclimatize to life in the cage after a career spent competing in the boxing ring but towards the end of the opening round he began to find his range, ripping some vicious hooks to the midriff of his opponent.

Mashamaite is one of few foreigners to have fought at the Channel 7 Stadium in Bangkok and has a very high level of Muay Thai but it was no match for the powerful punching of his Thai opponent, who is a former WBA Super Featherweight champion.

Speaking after the fight Yodsanan said he had enjoyed his first foray into the world of MMA and was looking forward to getting back inside the cage again, “I was not scared because I know I can do MMA as well as boxing. I hope a lot of people in Thailand will watch this fight when it is shown on ESPN Star Sports and maybe they will start to like MMA because everyone in Thailand already knows me because of my boxing. I would like to thank Chatri Sityodthong and all the trainers at Evolve MMA who helped me to prepare for this fight,” he said.

In the main event of the night Filipino Eduard Folayang won a unanimous decision over A Sol Kwon. The highly rated Korean was a late replacement for Ole Laursen, the owner of the Legacy Gym in Ubon Ratchatani and a long time Thailand resident, who injured his knee in training a few weeks before the fight.

Folayang showed immense courage to battle on despite a broken nose and several cuts to his face, constantly moving forward despite some accurate counter striking from Kwon. The aggression of the Filipin, rather than the precision of the Korean, caught the judges eye with all three awarding the victory to Folayang.

It was a good night for the Filipino fighters as Eric Kelly scored an impressive submission win over Yodsanan’s Evolve MMA team mate Mitch Chilson. In perhaps the most impressive performance of the entire evening Kelly survived an early takedown to cut Chilson with a vicious elbow before putting him to sleep with a rear naked choke.

ONE Fighting Championship has plans to put on shows in cities all over Asia including Bangkok and is likely to feature more Thai and Thai based fighters on future cards. For more information visit: http://www.onefc.com/

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-- 2011-09-05

[plumeria]

I wonder how this fits into the real world of MMA and the UFC?

The recent event in Brazil was truly impressive.

Does this guy stand a chance against that level of expertise?

[dezy1801]

I wonder how this fits into the real world of MMA and the UFC?

The recent event in Brazil was truly impressive.

Does this guy stand a chance against that level of expertise?

I would think he stands a chance at that level as he is a World Champion at Boxing and is training out of Evolve which has a great team there that has helped him evolve his ground game and the other aspects required to go to the top in MMA.

[peteryeah]

One FC has a lot of real legit high level fighters. Even "real world" worthy I'd say

Rafael Dos Anjos who fights in the UFC is also training at Evolve so for sure they got a great team...