While that hasn’t stopped several former mixed martial artists from trying their hand at boxing, notably Ben Askren and Dillon Danis, common sense has prevailed.

Kane holds an impressive 6-1 record and has won five out of his six ONE Championship fights. Reug Reug is coming off three straight wins and, had his contract not been allowed to lapse, would probably have been in pole position for a shot at heavyweight champion Anatoly Malykhin.

Reug Reug has been extremely outspoken on social media in recent months and aimed several barbs at Malykhin. Last month he signaled that the contract negotiations were going well telling his 225,000 Instagram followers that “this fake champion Anatoly Malykhin has been put on notice by his bosses”.

Malykhin is currently busy losing weight in order to fight for the middleweight title at ONE 166 in Qatar. The Russian probably won’t be defending his heavyweight belt until the end of the year but Reug Reug clearly has him in his cross hairs.

Nolan added to ONE Fight 18 card

British lightweight Liam Nolan has been booked to face Ali Aliev in a Muay Thai fight at Lumpinee Stadium on Saturday at ONE Fight Night 18.

Nolan lost his first two ONE Championship fights, but bounced back to win three out of his next four and is coming off a victory over Eddie Abasolo at ONE Fight Night 4.

Chatri Sityodtong, the ONE Championship CEO, told Sky Sports he believed Nolan had “the potential of being a very big, global superstar”.

“I think with an outstanding performance the UK fans are going to fall in love with him,” he added.

The card has also been bolstered by the addition of a couple of big MMA fights. Hard hitting Korean Kang Ji-Won (6-2) will be looking to bounce back from a recent defeat when he welcomes Dutch veteran Mikhail Jamal Abdul-Latif (3-0) who is fighting for the first time in over a decade.

In the opening fight of the night Mark Abelardo (22-10) takes on Ibrahim Dauev (8-1). The former is fighting for ONE Championship for the 13th time while the latter makes his promotional debut.

The featherweight MMA fight between Shamil Gasanov (10-1) and Oh Ho-Taek (9-3-1) will now serve as the main event. The card had originally been headlined by Superlek Kiatmoo9 and Elias Mahmoudi but the latter suffered an injury in training while the former stepped up to face Takeru at ONE 165.

Rodtang out, Superlek in

ONE 165 will now be headlined by a title fight. Superlek Kiatmoo9 is putting his featherweight kickboxing belt on the line against Takeru at the Ariake Arena on January 28th.

Takeru’s original opponent, Rodtang Jitmuangnon, had to withdraw because of injury. In his place steps Superlek who will take on the Japanese superstar and former three division K-1 champion in the main event.

While Takeru will be making his ONE Championship debut having established himself as one of the best kickboxers in the world, Superlek is coming off a win over Rodtang at ONE Friday Fights 46.

His title was not on the line that day because he missed weight, but the Thai comes into this bout on the back of a 10 fight winning streak.

This will be ONE Championship’s first fight card in Japan since 2019. There are currently two title matches on the card with Kade Ruotolo set to defend his lightweight submission grappling belt against Tommy Langaker in the co-main event.

The rest of the card consists exclusively of MMA bouts. Former ONE Championship lightweight champion Shinya Aoki is taking on UFC veteran Sage Northcutt in a lightweight bout that has been several years in the making.

Former lightweight and featherweight champion Martin Nguyen has been booked to take on former featherweight title challenger Garry Tonon. In the atomweight division an all Japanese clash pits Ayaka Miura against Itsuki Hirata.