ONE Championship: Pursuit of Power saw a couple of welterweight upsets that could help shape the division moving forward.
Now that a busy weekend of MMA is over, it’s time to step back and reflect on the action. The show that kicked the festivities off, ONE Championship: Pursuit of Power, saw a changing of the guard on Friday. Favorites fell, and the welterweight landscape was reshaped.
In the main event, Agilan Thani’s rise back to the top of the welterweight division was halted when he fell to Zebaztian Kadestam. Both men had previously challenged for Ben Askren’s title, now vacant in the wake of the American’s retirement. Yet Thani was clearly the favorite heading in. The ‘Alligator’ was fighting at home after all, anchoring the main event of the Pursuit of Power card. However it was Kadestam who came out on top, halting Thani’s two fight win streak.
Luis Santos, who Kadestam had defeated to earn his crack at Ben Askren, was also a favorite on the night. Yet like Thani, Santos, paired up against America’s Tyler McGuire, would also come up short. The man who gave Askren his toughest test was controlled by the school teacher on the way to a unanimous decision loss. That dropped Santos to 1-2 in his last three.
Where the welterweight division goes from here is anyone’s guess, but you can relive the action in the gallery below courtesy of ONE Championship!
