Russia’s Anatoly Malykhin, meanwhile, is well on his way to becoming the dominant force in ONE. He now holds belts in three divisions, adding Reinier de Ridder’s middleweight title to the heavyweight and light-heavvweight ones he already owned.

There were two disqualifications as well. One for Jarred Brooks, who lost his strawweight crown in the process, and another that spared Arjan Bhullar any further damage at the hands of Amir Aliakbari.

Tang’s battle with Le might have ended in dramatic fashion, but it started slowly with both men yellow carded during the opening round. Le was fighting as a southpaw and the change in tactic seemed to initially confuse his Chinese opponent.

The champion started to find his rhythm in the second round and landed a left hook which damaged Le’s nose, and with the American backtracking he landed a right hand and easily evaded a takedown attempt.

Another left hook landed for Le and it was followed up with a hard right body kick. The Chinese fighter appeared to be in the ascendancy, but a late exchange of punches left him bleeding from the nose.

Tang landed another left hook at the start of the third before Le was yellow carded for the second time with the referee unhappy with his output. Another left hook from the champion found its mark and with seconds remaining in the round he landed the telling blow.

Le might have been expecting a left hook as Tang ducked in that direction, but instead it was the right hand which landed. The American was stunned and the champion wasted no time in attacking with ground and pound with the referee stepping in at the 4:48 mark.

With the win Tang, who was also handed a US$50,000 bonus for his efforts, improved to 18-2. Le dropped to 14-4 after falling short in his bid to capture the belt for a second time.

Malykhin never seemed likely to lose his bid for a third title, and was dominating when de Ridder shot for a takedown in the third round.

The Russian got back to his feet, but his opponent, who had taken some heavy punishment up to that point could not continue. The finish came at the 1:16 mark and took Malykhin to 14-0.

De Ridder dropped to 16-2 after losing to the same opponent twice in succession, albeit in different weight classes.

There was disappointment too for Brooks who made a fast start to his strawweight title fight with Joshua Pacio.

He took the Filipino back from a standing position and tried to lock in a rear naked choke before slamming him into the canvass.

Pacio was instantly knocked out and Brooks celebrated wildly. Unfortunately for the American slamming an opponent head first is not legal under ONE Championship rules.

As a result Brooks was disqualified and Pacio, who had to be stretchered from the cage, was awarded the win. The American dropped to 20-3 while the Filipino improved to 22-5 and became a ONE Championship strawweight champion for the third time.