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It's undeniable that the rivalry between Xiong Jing Nan and Angela Lee is one of the pillars that shaped ONE Championship today.
Xiong is the inaugural ONE women’s strawweight MMA world champion, while Lee is the first person to win the ONE women’s atomweight MMA world title.
The pair figured in a classic trilogy that saw both world titles being contested. Xiong won the two strawweight matches, while Lee retained her gold in their sole atomweight meeting.
While a fourth match between the two queens was surely warranted, that bout will never come to reality after Lee announced her retirement from the sport.
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Lee had her emotional announcement at ONE Fight Night 14 at Singapore Indoor Stadium, the same card Xiong fought Nat ‘Wondergirl’ Jaroonsak in a special rules striking match.
Following her victory over ‘Wondergirl’, Xiong recalled in her post-fight interview how her rivalry with Lee became one of the greatest moments of her career.
Xiong said:
“So first of all, I would like to thank Angela Lee. She is a good opponent, and the way we faced each other at our best age, and best situations, and at the best stage. So I think those are really great things. I hope in the future, you can take care of yourself, your family, and, of course your baby.”
The pair had their first meeting in March 2019 in Tokyo in a fight that Xiong closed out with a fifth-round technical knockout win to retain her ONE women’s strawweight MMA world title.
Lee then evened the score in October of that year when she submitted Xiong in the fifth round in Japan’s capital city to retain her atomweight crown.
Their third match took three years of build-up, but it was pure MMA at its finest.
Xiong and Lee delivered one of the best women’s MMA matches on the planet when they battered each other for the full five rounds at ONE on Prime Video 2 in September 2022.
Although Lee had her moments in the later rounds, Xiong’s domination earlier in the fight earned her the unanimous decision in her world title defense.
Watch Xiong's entire interview below:
