“I’m doing it for my legacy” – Martin Nguyen on desire to make another run at featherweight MMA gold

Former two-division ONE world champion Martin Nguyen is ready for one more run at featherweight gold.

This Sunday, January 28, ‘The Situ-Asian’ returns to the Circle for the first time since his impressive decision victory over Leonardo Casotti in February. Stepping inside the Ariake Arena in Tokyo, Japan, Nguyen will meet top-ranked featherweight contender Garry Tonon as a part of a stacked ONE 165 card.

With a win over ‘The Lion Killer,’ Martin Nguyen could very well be in line for a shot at the promotion’s reigning featherweight king.

“How I’ve been mentally preparing for this fight is, you know, just refocusing what are my main goals of doing this,” Nguyen said on the From The Stands podcast. “Obviously, it is to get that title back – that’s why am I doing it, for my legacy and my family. And I had to kind of refocus all that and not revamp but just make sure that I'm on point when it comes to the fighting mindset when it comes into the fight.”

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Martin Nguyen faces one of ONE’s most dangerous submission specialists

Martin Nguyen won the featherweight and lightweight world titles with back-to-back victories over Marat Gafurov and Eduard Folayaing. In more recent years, ‘The Situ-Asian’ has struggled to find the win column, but a return-to-form performance at ONE Fight Night 7 last year has fans excited to see if he can put together another iconic run.

Standing in his way will be one of the promotion’s most dangerous submission specialists. Garry Tonon has eight wins under the ONE Championship banner, five of them coming by sub, with another two more via KO for an incredible 88% finish rate.

Will ‘The Lion Killer’ add another highlight to his resume in The Land of the Rising Sun?

ONE 165 airs live on Sunday, January 28, via global pay-per-view at watch.onefc.com.