By:  | November 19, 2022 9:11 pm

Aung La Nsang got back to winning ways at ONE 164. The Burmese middleweight faced fellow veteran Yushin Okami at the Singapore Indoor Stadium in a fight that had been in the works for nearly two years but lasted less than two minutes.

La Nsang came out aggressively and tried a high kick right from the opening bell. Okami shot for an early takedown but immediately found himself on his back.

La Nsang elected to stand up and as Okami shot for another takedown he hit the UFC veteran with a kick to the head. From there La Nsang unloaded with punches and elbows but the experienced Japanese fighter covered up and kept his composure.

Okami was not offering any offence but he was covering up and defending himself intelligently. Referee Herb Dean decided he had seen enough however and decided to call off the contest.

Paying tribute

While Okami would not have been able to survive such an onslaught indefinitely he didn’t appear to be in too much trouble at the time of the stoppage. But La Nsang wasn’t complaining as he claimed the 13th win of his ONE Championship career.

The finish came at the 1:42 mark and sees La Nsang extend his record to 28-13-0-1. The week wasn’t a total success for the 37 year old, he was told afterwards that he had missed out on a $50,000 USD bonus after failing to make weight on time.

During the post fight interview an emotional La Nsang paid tribute to Anthony Johnson. The UFC veteran passed away last week and he was clearly hit hard by the loss of his Kill Cliff MMA teammate and training partner.

Having been beaten twice by reigning middleweight and light heavyweight champion Reinier de Ridder the 37 year old knows he is unlikely to win another title. But La Nsang stated after the fight that he is happy to be a gatekeeper and challenged any contenders in the middleweight division to try and beat him.