ONE Championship: Martin Nguyen focused on getting featherweight crown back, eyes ‘all or nothing’ Tonon fight
- Martin Nguyen and Garry Tonon will clash at ONE 165 show in Japan, with winner likely to get title shot
- Regular featherweight champion Tang Kai clashes with interim holder Thanh Le at ONE 166
Martin Nguyen knows what it takes to be a champion. He has held the ONE Championship lightweight and featherweight titles and is on a mission to recapture the latter.
Nguyen faces Garry Tonon at ONE 165 in a fight that could turn out to be a title eliminator. Currently ranked third at featherweight, his opponent is No 1 and the Australian told the Post this fight was “all or nothing”.
“Where I’m at in my career, this is definitely the right fight to make for the No 1 contendership,” Nguyen said. “We’ve both had our shots at the title and we want to get back there. It’s going to be a banger.”
Nguyen held the featherweight title for three years before his reign was ended by Thanh Le, who finished him in the third round in 2020.
Tonon also came up against Le, but the American was stopped inside a minute in 2022 and it sounds like Nguyen has had this fight playing on constant rotation.
“It’s definitely a blueprint,” Nguyen said. “He [Tonon] was on a seven fight winning streak and he got exposed [by Le]. The blueprint is there.”