Aung La N Sang says Anatoly Malykhin was always ‘stylistically a bad matchup’ for Reinier de Ridder

Aung La N Sang watched on at ONE 166: Qatar as the ONE middleweight world championship that he used to hold was contested in the main event.

The man that beat him for the title, Reinier de Ridder, put the belt on the line in a rematch.

Anatoly Malykhin maintained his undefeated record and made history as MMA’s first three-weight world champion by stopping ‘The Dutch Knight’ in the third round.

Aung La N Sang reflected on the fight during a recent interview with ONE Championship where he said that he wasn’t surprised by the outcome.

He put Malykhin’s success against de Ridder down to a clash of styles that will never work out particularly well for the Dutch submission specialist:

“It was a great fight. It went as I expected. We all know how some people can be stylistically a bad matchup for a certain fighter, and it doesn’t really matter what you do in a year’s time. Some people are just stylistically a bad matchup.”

Aung La N Sang will have been watching closely for good reason

Aung La N Sang will have been watching that fight in Qatar on March 1 with a notebook at hand ready to study both men.

The former middleweight and light heavyweight world champion is coming off of a three-fight win streak where the judges have not been needed.

Though he knows that time isn’t necessarily on his side and it isn’t clear what will be next for Malykhin across his three weight divisions, ‘The Burmese Python’ is hoping to get a shot at the history maker.

He’s produced some incredible highlights throughout his career but becoming the first man to defeat Malykhin could go down as his biggest ever win.

North American viewers that missed out on any of the action from ONE 166: Qatar can watch the entire event back via the free on demand replay at Prime Video.