ONE Lightweight World Champion Christian Lee retained his title while ONE Atomweight Kickboxing World Champion Janet “JT” Todd furthered her quest for becoming two-sport title holder during “ONE on TNT II” in Singapore on Wednesday, April 14, 2021.
Lee superstar wasted no time dispatching the challenge of his arguably his biggest challenger to date in Russian slugger Timofey Nastyukhin. “The Warrior” finished his rival round one, just 73 second going into the fight, of their mixed martial arts contest in retaining his belt.
Lee unleashed a pinpoint counter left hook as Nastyukhin lunged in with a looping right hand. The hook found its mark on the chin and send the Russian to his knees. Singaporean-American superstar followed his attack by swarming his foe with powerful right hand and kept on pounding away until the referee had no choice but to intervene and call off the bout.
Lee’s notched a second successful title defense pushed his record to 15-3 and extended his record of most wins (15) and most finishes (14) in ONE Championship history.
Nastyukhin dropped to 14-5. He now has 3 losses by knockouts.
On the other hand, Todd made her campaign for a second belt in another sport prosper as she scored her second straight ONE Super Series Muay Thai win of 2021 by stopping Anne “Ninja” Line Hogstad in round three of their bout.
Todd, who came into this fight as the #2-ranked atomweight Muay Thai contender, defeated the #3-ranked Hogstad, ending their match with a spectacular crushing liver shot.
The American used her superior skills that have made her one of the world’s best strikers to stop the Norwegian. Todd strategically picked her shots from the outside, throwing a variety of high and low kicks while trying to sneak jabs and straight rights through her rival’s guard.
The tactic was effective as Todd was able to keep herself far enough as Hogstad couldn’t land enough shot as she tried to fire back. In the few instances they found their mark, most of the hits were deflected by the American superstar and were countered.
The end came when Todd threw a jab at Hogstad that got her to raise her guard. When “Ninja” did, “JT” launched a lead leg body kick into her liver that sent Hogstad to her knees. The referee counted here out at 1:36 of round three.
Meanwhile, the three mixed martial arts contests that kicked off the event set the pace for the rest of the night, as fans were treated to a brilliant submission victory, a heated knockout win, and a controversial disqualification.
The other bouts in the card saw Yoshiki Nakahara defeat Shinechagtga Zoltsetseg via disqualification in a MMA featherweight bout; Wang “Little Whirlwind” Shuo stop Kim Kyu Sung via knockout at 1:51 of round three of their flyweight bout; and Shuya “Stealth” Kamikubo tapping out Mitchell “Mama’s Boy” Chamale via a rear-naked choke submission at 2:13 of round two of their bantamweight bout.
Wang connected to perfection a well-timed crossing elbow to perfection to the jaw and followed it up with a few more puches to Kim who had hit the deck, and a few more punches sealed the deal.
Kamikubo connected hooks that softened up Chamale with punches until he could slide an arm under the chin to lock up the rear-naked choke. Chamale had no choice but to tap out at 2:13 of round two.
By Armando M. Bolislis
