Anatoly Malykhin attempts to become ONE Triple Champ in March

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Reinier De Ridder and Anatoly Malykhin stare each other down at the ONE on Prime Video 5 Faceoffs
Reinier De Ridder and Anatoly Malykhin stare each other down at the ONE on Prime Video 5 Faceoffs1920×1280 1020 KB

Anatoly “Sladkiy” Malykhin already has the ONE Heavyweight and Light Heavyweight MMA World Titles in his possession, and soon, he’ll have a chance to make history.

On Friday, March 1, the Russian superstar will move down a weight class again and attempt to become the first three-division MMA World Champion at Lusail Sports Arena in Qatar.

In the main event of ONE 166: Qatar, Malykhin will challenge ONE Middleweight MMA World Champion Reinier de Ridder – the man he beat for the light heavyweight crown last year – in a high-stakes rematch for the Dutchman’s gold.

These mixed martial artists first met at ONE Fight Night 5 in December 2022.

De Ridder entered that ONE Light Heavyweight MMA World Title defense as an undefeated two-division king, while the Russian challenger already held the interim heavyweight MMA belt.

Unlike anyone before him, Malykhin brilliantly defended takedowns from the lanky grappler and utilized his heavy boxing repertoire to knock out the Dutchman in the first round.

Not only did “Sladkiy” hand De Ridder his first professional loss, but the victory also gave him the light heavyweight MMA crown and made him a two-division World Champion.

Each man has taken a very different path since that encounter.

De Ridder continued to travel across the United States to train with the world’s best Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu coaches and athletes, and he even put his skills to the test against Tye Ruotolo in a submission grappling super-fight last May.

Meanwhile, Malykhin finally squared off against heated rival and then-ONE Heavyweight MMA World Champion Arjan “Singh” Bhullar in a unification match last June.

The Russian would ultimately overwhelm the Canadian-Indian juggernaut and finish him via third-round TKO to emerge as the undisputed heavyweight MMA king.

Now, all roads lead to the main event of ONE 166: Qatar, and each man has everything to fight for.

De Ridder has a chance to even the score, hand Malykhin his first professional loss, and prove he is the best middleweight mixed martial artist on the planet today.

But for Malykhin, history is calling. If he defeats the Dutchman one more time, “Sladkiy” would become the first three-division World Champion in MMA.

Stay tuned to onefc.com for more news about ONE 166: Qatar.

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https://www.mmanews.com/news/one-double-champion-anatoly-malykhin-third-title-2024

ONE Championship titleholder Anatoly Malykhin will look to etch his name into the history books in 2024.

Malykhin has had a rapid rise to success under the ONE banner, winning both the Asian organization’s light heavyweight and heavyweight titles in just five fights since signing in early 2021.

And the 35-year-old Russian’s pursuit of gold is not finished there, with the promotion announcing this week that he’ll attempt a historic three-division feat in a rematch with middleweight kingpin Reinier de Ridder.

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The thing about Malykhin becoming the first triple champ in big promotion history…a. the big promotion he is in has very, very tiny talent pools at the three weights he is champ in compared to the other bigger promotions and b. two of his three belts are gonna come off the same fighter.

So even if Malykhin can become a MW-HW triple champ in ONE that is still not nearly as big an achievement as something like PItbull capturing the BW-LW titles in Bellator or Pereira doing it in UFC. Still a big deal, no argument there.

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Depth of talent pools aside, let’s not pretend that he didn’t benefit tremendously from a couple of very favorable match-ups in his case.

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For sure the fights he got at MW and LHW have been somewhat favorable so far and its not like he had to win ten in a row in the UFC to earn his title shot like some guys but he still made good on the huge opportunities and still had to make that brutal cut for the lowest of the three weight classes.

Now if he wants to reach the goal of triple champ he is gonna have to beat a 260 lb Tom Aspinall and there is nothing favorable about that for him.

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ONE matchmaking is downright atrocious. Nothing but one sided mixed rules, crossover sport, and double champ fights nobody asked for. Champions never fight contenders in their own sport and division.

Like why make this fight after RDR got completely destroyed by a much bigger Malykhin? The MMA divisions are pretty much already frozen as is.

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Malaykhin is possibly the best fighter in the world.

Almost odd how so few people know about him.

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Amazing how he can drift across 3 weight classes despite not cutting weight, truly ONE has solved weight cutting

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Impressive that he beat up a reindeer… I’ll see myself out

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I don’t consider Malykhin a real 3 weight champ compared to if he did that in Bellator or UFC.

He did it at 205, 225 and HW plus he won two of the three titles from the same fighter.

On top of that ONE’s MW, LHW and HW divisions are almost empty and they barely have any fights in those divisions.

Chatri says a lot of things but ONE is not a major force in MMA in terms of their talent pools.

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Bhullar won the title form Vera who was in his 40’s. He got the title shot by beating Cerelli who I don’t think was even ranked in the top 100 HW’s at fightmatrix. Bhullar has lost to Malykhin and Aliakbari since then.

I think Malykhin would do well in the UFC but I’d like to see him under the UFC’s drug testing program.

The vast majority of the best LHW’s and HW’s are in PFL and UFC.

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