While Kevin “The Silencer” Belingon has Mark Sangiao of Team Lakay, Martin “The Situ-Asian” Nguyen has Fari Salievski of KMA. On July 27, 2018, Belingon and Nguyen will compete for the ONE Interim Bantamweight World Championship in the main event of “ONE: Reign of Kings.”

Belingon and Nguyen had their face-off during the “ONE: Reign of Kings” press conference at the City of Dreams Manila in Paranaque City, Metro Manila, Philippines. During the event, I had a quick interview with Nguyen’s trainer.

“I don’t want to see this fight go to five rounds obviously in his favor,” Salievski told me, referring to Nguyen. The coach added that reaching five rounds is not the style of his student.

This is not the first time Nguyen is competing for a third belt. His two most recent bouts reached the fifth round and ended in split decision, one in his favor and the other in his opponent’s favor.

After becoming the ONE Featherweight and Lightweight World Champion on November 10, 2017 by dethroning Team Lakay fighter Eduard “Landslide” Folayang, Nguyen faced Bibiano “The Flash” Fernandes for the ONE Bantamweight World Championship. After five rounds in the main event of “ONE: Iron Will” on March 24, 2018, Nguyen lost to Fernandes via split decision.

On May 18, 2018, Nguyen defended his featherweight belt for the first time. After five rounds with challenger Christian “The Warrior” Lee at “ONE: Unstoppable Dreams,” the Vietnamese-Australian champion won via split decision.

Nguyen now holds a professional mixed martial arts record of 11 wins and 2 losses. The only two fighters to defeat him were Fernandes and former ONE Featherweight World Champion Marat “Cobra” Gafurov.

On the other hand, Belingon now has 18 wins and 5 losses. He is riding a five-bout winning streak and “ONE: Reign of Kings” marks his second attempt at a title.

Meanwhile, watch my full interview with Salievski here: