ONE’s Chatri Sityodong on Reug Reug Hiatus, Nieky Holzken Return, and ONE Canada (?)

Following ONE: Heavy Hitters, many questions were out there as the dust settled on the kickoff event of the calendar year.

After ONE’s first card of 2022 that featured a lot of great action and many announcements for their coming events, many questions still remain. This is generally the case when looking at the coming 50 weeks within a given year after an electric night of action.

I spoke with ONE Championship figurehead Chatri Sityodtong at the ONE: Heavy Hitters post-event virtual media day. Excerpts from our interaction are below and we covered a few subjects.

Insights were given from the ONE CEO on the return of kickboxing great Nieky Holzken, if ONE Championship is looking at doing an event in Canada, and details on the Oumar Kane aka Reug Reug hiatus.

Holzken return and ONE Canada (?)

Nieky Holzken teasing his next bout and when that is

“Nieky’s (Holzken) next fight has been signed, I believe. We just haven’t announced it yet… I think he’s signed to fight in February if I’m not mistaken.”

If ONE Championship has done any preliminary work towards a ONE Championship event in Canada

“We did briefly look at Canada. Last year in the middle of the pandemic as a potential place we could throw an event during the pandemic, but we eventually scratched it. I don’t foresee a Canada event for the foreseeable future. Yeah, I mean, I definitely would love to go to Canada. Just right now we’ve just got so much on our plate in different countries. Different priorities right now.”

Reug Reug Hiatus

If there has been any dialogue about getting Reug Reug back into the ONE Circle

“Yes, I believe Reug Reug has been offered a fight. I may be wrong. But yeah, of course, we definitely want to get him in there. He’s definitely a viral sensation. He’s obviously a monster. And he did have a controversial loss. We’d love to see him back in action.”

Dylan Bowker

I've been enamored with combat sports for as long as I can remember. I've hosted MMA talk shows Lights Out and Pure Fight Radio with featured guests like Jens Pulver, Roy Nelson, Miesha Tate, Mark Coleman, and more. I've been an MMA broadcaster for XFFC as well as BTC and have done play by play commentary on live pay per view on GFL as well as FITE TV. I've provided written, audio, and video content covering some of the biggest MMA promotions like Rumble in the Cage, Unified MMA, and King of the Cage. I've worked as a sports entertainment personality for over five years and given play-by-play or featured promotions of KSW, ONE Championship, TKO, and Invicta FC. My work can be found in the USA Today Sports affiliate MMA Torch, Cageside Press, MMA Sucka, and Liberty Multimedia.

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