Reece McLaren forces Gianni Subba to tap out. |
By Ivan Saldajeno
MANILA--Reece McLaren and Danny Kingad scored contrasting yet shocking wins at One: Visions of Victory at the Axiata Arena in Kuala Lumpur on Friday night.
The fact that they ended up with different opponents from the original schedule following Adriano Moraes' decision to back out of the said fight card added more significance to their wins.
McLaren, who was supposed to face Moraes for the One flyweight belt, battled the equally-challenging Gianni Subba, Kingad's supposed opponent, in the headliner.
However, the Filipino-Australian fighter showed that he is ready for anyone as he stunned Subba's hometown crowd with an arm triangle submission win at the 3:12 mark of Round 2.
Kingad, on the other hand, went up against Sotir Kichukov, and the Bulgarian late replacement turned out to be tough as well.
Kichukov, following a slow start that even saw Kingad trying to finish him off via submission in the very first round, picked up the pace in the last two rounds, even putting up submission attempts on Kingad at some points.
Kingad banked on his takedown defense to survive Kichukov's grit en route to a unanimous decision win that somehow drew mixed reactions.
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