Danny Kingad needed to dig deep, with a little bit of luck, on Friday evening during ONE: Fire and Fury at the SM Mall of Asia Arena.
The Team Lakay standout eked out a unanimous decision win over Xie Wei to bounce back into the win column.
Kingad is coming off a unanimous decision loss to Demetrious Johnson during the Final of the ONE Flyweight World Grand Prix last October. He needed to produce a huge third round against his Chinese opponent to take this win.
The final stanza itself went back-and-forth, as both Xie and Kingad did not back down. However, an illegal headbutt by the Chinese fighter early in the bout; then an illicit knee to the head with 20 seconds left might have helped Kingad’s cause.
Kingad went up to 14-2, taking his seventh win in his last eight fights. Meanwhile, Xie dropped to 5-3.
Earlier, Top Gym BF’s Kwon Won Il could not bag the win, falling to Japanese athlete Shoko Sato via rear-naked choke with 56 seconds left in the round.
Kwon fell to 8-3 while decorate Sato rose to 35-16-3.
In other bouts, Norwegian Anne Line Hogstad (14-5) took a majority decision win over Australian Alma Juniku (24-5) in an atomweight Muay Thai bout; Tatsumitsu Wada (22-11) dealt Ivanildo Delfino his first mixed martial arts loss in nine fights via a dominant decision; while former ONE Flyweight Muay Thai World Champion Petchdam Petchyindee Academy (95-15) took a majority decision win over Momotaro (28-11)
