WATCH: Anatoly Malykhin goes headhunting in brutal knockout of Dutch star Reinier de Ridder in Manila

On March 1, Anatoly Malykhin has the opportunity to make ONE Championship history when he meets the promotion’s reigning and defending middleweight MMA world titleholder, Reinier de Ridder.

Already maintaining a first grasp on the light heavyweight and heavyweight MMA world titles, Anatoly Malykhin will go for a third piece of gold when he meets ‘The Dutch Knight’ in a rematch more than a year in the making. The first time they met at ONE on Prime Video 5, ‘Sladkiy’ walked through de Ridder, adding yet another first-round knockout to his resume and claiming the Dutchman’s light heavyweight MMA world title.

This time, Malykhin will try to do it once more, taking the middleweight crown in the process and etching his name into the ONE history books.

“CRUSHING 💥 Can Anatoly Malykhin score another knockout of Reinier de Ridder at ONE 166: Qatar and become ONE’s first three-division World Champion?”

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Will Anatoly Malykhin maintain his signature power at middleweight?

Going into their December 2022 meeting, fight fans were seemingly split with many of them expecting Reinier de Ridder to put his BJJ skills to work and hand Anatoly Malykhin the first loss of his mixed martial arts career. The other half believed the Russian juggernaut’s fists would stop de Ridder before he could even land a takedown.

In the end, Malykhin’s fists won the day, but many question whether or not he can pull off a repeat performance the second time around given the change in weight class. The move to middleweight could affect Malykhin’s cardio and power, giving ‘The Dutch Knight’ a greater opportunity to work the big man down and put his impeccable grappling game to work.

How do you see things playing out in the ONE 166 headliner?

ONE 166: Qatar goes down at Lusail Sports Arena and will air live on March 1, via global pay-per-view at watch.onefc.com.