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Bokang Masunyane (left) and Hiroba Minowa at the ONE 159 ceremonial weigh-ins in Singapore.
Martial ArtsMixed Martial Arts

Exclusive | ONE Championship 159: Bokang Masunyane, Zeba Bano miss weight with two fights scratched from card

  • Hiroba Minowa rejects offer of catchweight bout with South Africa’s ‘Little Giant’ on Friday night’s card in Singapore
  • Lea Bivins’ debut against India’s Bano also cancelled, but Vitaly Bigdash passes final pre-fight hydration test for main event against Reinier de Ridder
ONE Championship
Nicolas Atkin
Tom Taylor
Nicolas AtkinandTom Taylor
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Friday night’s ONE Championship 159 card has taken a couple of late hits, with Bokang Masunyane and Zeba Bano failing to make weight in their final pre-fight tests, a source has told the Post.

The main event at Singapore Indoor Stadium is intact, however, with Vitaly Bigdash passing a hydration test on Friday morning, having failed to hit the mark at Thursday’s official weigh-ins. The 37-year-old Russian will take on two-division champ Reinier de Ridder for the middleweight MMA title.

Strawweights Masunyane and Hiroba Minowa – both of whom are coming off defeats by No 1 contender Jarred Brooks – will no longer face off in the Circle, with the Japanese star rejecting a catchweight bout.

Lea Bivins (left) and Zeba Bano at the ONE 159 ceremonial weigh-ins.

India’s Bano also missed weight on Friday morning, and her atomweight MMA bout with 20-year-old American debutant Lea Bivins has also been scratched from Friday’s line-up.

The rest of the card remains intact, with nine fights set to go down at ONE 159, including an interim atomweight Muay Thai title fight between American kickboxing champ Janet Todd and the debuting Spaniard Lara Fernandez in the co-main event.

Asian martial arts promotion ONE facilitates hydration tests to discourage the extreme weight-cutting practices common throughout the combat sports industry. Athletes are required to maintain a hydration value less than or equal to 1.0250 on their two pre-fight tests.

Reinier de Ridder (right) and Vitaly Bigdash at the ONE Championship 159 weigh-ins in Singapore. Photo: ONE Championship.

ONE Championship 159 Main Card

  • Middleweight MMA title fight: Reinier de Ridder (205lbs) vs Vitaly Bigdash (203lbs)

  • Interim atomweight Muay Thai title fight: Janet Todd (114lbs) vs Lara Fernandez (115lbs)

  • Bantamweight MMA: Muangthai PK. Saenchai (145lbs) vs Vladimir Kuzmin (145lbs)

  • Strawweight kickboxing: Zhang Peimian (125lbs) vs Aslanbek Zikreev (125lbs)

  • Strawweight MMA: Zelang Zhaxi (125lbs) vs Danial Williams (125lbs)

ONE Championship 159 Lead Card

  • Featherweight Muay Thai: Jo Nattawut (155lbs) vs Jamal Yusupov (154lbs)

  • Lightweight Muay Thai: Sinsamut Klinmee (170lbs) vs Liam Nolan (169lbs)

  • Lightweight MMA: Ariel Sexton (167lbs) vs Marat Gafurov (170lbs)

  • Welterweight MMA: Jin Tae-ho (183lbs) vs Valmir da Silva (184lbs)

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