Striking: Kiamrian Abbasov (left) trades punches with James Nakashima in their welterweight encounter in 2020. (ONE Championship)
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head of his fight at ONE: FULL CIRCLE, Kiamrian Abbasov is unfazed by Reinier de Ridder’s claim that he will dominate him bell to bell. Instead, Kiamrian believes the idea is laughable.
Kiamrian, who is set to challenge the two-division champion this Friday, aims to spoil his opponent’s perfect record, disproving his claim of being the best grappler in the world.
“De Ridder is, without a doubt, a good fighter. His record speaks for itself: 14-0 without any defeat. But he has talked about himself a lot lately, that he’s the best grappler in the world or that he can knock me out easily,” Kiamrian said.
“What a funny guy, we’ll see if he can deliver. His unblemished record is a motivation for me, I’d like to be the first guy to spoil it,” he added.
The ONE welterweight world champion attained the gold by dominating Zebastian Kadeztam in October 2019. Since then, he has proven his well-rounded skills by knocking out the previously undefeated James Nakashima to defend his title.
Read also: De Ridder promises domination over challenger Abbasov at ONE: FULL CIRCLE
Despite facing an opponent with a 10-centimeter height advantage and fighting in a world title match-up, “Brazen” believes that the outcome of the fight will be the same.
“Many people could’ve beaten me, but in the end, I was the one who got his hand raised. My opponents either got knocked out or lost on points,” Kiamrian said. “If De Ridder thinks our match will be a walk in the park, let him. It’s going to play to my advantage.”
Kiamrian made his intention of becoming a double champ and moving up to middleweight clear in June 2020, when he fixed his sights on Aung La N Sang and pushed for a super fight with the then-champ. But since the title was snatched by De Ridder, the welterweight king has shifted his attention to the new champion.
Despite this, Aung La called out Kiamrian, and the champ in turn was open to the contest – especially if both men managed to earn a victory in their respective matches.
“I believe it’ll be a tremendous five-round fight if we meet, a spectacular technical bout. It might even be the fight of the year for ONE,” Kiamrian said. “He pushes forward a lot; he’s very aggressive. I think we have a similar style. I also think he’s a good boxer for an MMA athlete.”
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This article was published in collaboration with ONE Championship.
