By Michael Angelo S. Murillo
Senior Reporter
IT was a big night for Filipino mixed martial arts fighters at ONE Championship’s “Reign of Kings” on Friday, going unbeaten in four featured fights and in the process highlighted how the Philippine MMA scene is coming along and improving.
Strawweights Rene Catalan and Joshua Pacio, lightweight Eduard Folayang and bantamweight Kevin Belingon all came away with convincing victories at the Mall of Asia Arena, with the latter going away as the biggest winner after bagging the interim ONE world bantamweight title over two-division champion Martin Nguyen.
Mr. Catalan set the tone for the Filipinos in the preliminaries early with a dominant unanimous decision victory over Indonesian Stefer Rahardian.
The 39-year-old Catalan was dominant right from the opening bell, exhibiting dynamic striking, feints, sweeping low leg kicks, and a powerful left hook that his opponent simply could not match.
Team Lakay’s Pacio then followed it up with a quick victory over Thai Pongsiri Mitsatit, submitting him with an armlock in the opening round.
Mr. Pacio, 22, a former world title challenger, slammed Mr. Mitsatit hard to the canvas before finishing things off with a straining armlock that eventually forced his opponent to tap at the 3:37 mark of the first round.
In the main card, Mr. Folayang, the former ONE lightweight champion, continued with his winning bouncing run with a unanimous decision win over Russian Aziz Pahrudinov.
Fighting for the second time after losing his title in November last year, Mr. Folayang turned a complete game, punctuated with solid leg kicks that greatly hampered Mr. Pahrudinov’s ability to put up a consistent challenge as the fight progressed.
Then Mr. Belingon completed the big night for the Filipinos, dominating in five full rounds to get the better of Mr. Nguyen in the main feature of Reign of Kings.
Displaying unrelenting striking and highly improved takedown defense, Mr. Belingon frustrated Mr. Nguyen, who was angling to add the bantamweight gold to his featherweight and lightweight belts, throughout the contest and hardly allowed the Vietnamese-Australian fighter to get his groove en route to winning.
The victory put Mr. Belingon, 30, in the list of current Filipino ONE world champions alongside Team Lakay stable mate Geje Eustaquio (flyweight) and Brandon Vera (heavyweight) and another shot at reigning bantamweight champion Bibiano Fernandes of Brazil.
IMPROVING
With three of his wards going away with victories, Team Lakay coach Mark Sangiao could not help but feel proud and highlight the significant improvement of their team and the whole local MMA scene in general.
“Back in the early days of ONE Championship we were going winless. But we made it a point to learn from all of those losses and find ways to improve ourselves. Now we are winning world titles because of all that hard work,” Mr. Sangiao said in the post-match press conference.
“I think the MMA scene here will continue improving, not only us, because other groups as well are making headway,” he added.
It is an observation that Mr. Catalan of Catalan Fighting System shares.
“This victory shows that Filipinos can compete in MMA on the world stage. Given the opportunities like what ONE is giving us I think we will continue improving and show what we can do,” said Mr. Catalan, whose group has been on a roll of late with fighters like Robin Catalan and Jomary Torres winning fights in succession.
Next for ONE Championship is “ONE: Beyond the Horizon” in Shanghai, China, on Sept. 8.

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