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Former ONE featherweight world champion Martin Nguyen has been quiet since his last fight in Singapore in September, but it’s sounding like we may hear from him again soon. A new fight booking could even be in the works.
A contingent of ONE Championship fighters train at Florida’s Kill Cliff FC, including Myanmar’s Aung La N Sang and Martin Nguyen. Aung La sat down with the South China Morning Post to discuss his upcoming fight with Yushin Okami, and his teammate was brought up.
When asked by interviewer Tom Taylor if he’d spoken to Martin Nguyen after his loss to Ilya Freymanov at ONE on Prime Video 2, Aung La said:
"I talked to him this morning, we talk very regularly. [He's] A little brother to me. We're good friends. So we stay in touch. This morning, we talked and he's going to probably come back in a few weeks. Get back in camp."
The fight was a rough go for Nguyen, who lost by TKO at 3:33 of the first round to Freymanov. The Russian hit him with a straight right, dropping Nyugen, and went for the finish with knees.
Nguyen was looking to get back into title contention after a third-round finish of Ukraine’s Kirill Gorobets in March, but his next fight didn’t go his way.
Kill Cliff FC is home to many Asian fighters from all around the continent, making the booming gym a home away from home for those who have traveled far.
Aung La believes Martin Nguyen needs to isolate himself and train
While it’s not always apparent to fans, the environment in training can have a huge effect on the performance on fight night.
In the same interview, Aung La N Sang spoke about what kind of improvements Martin Nguyen can make to his environment to have greater success in the future:
“You need to come back and train. Come live here in my house and train. Just clamp down a little bit and train. It's part of the game, these young guys are hungry, and these young guys start at such a younger age that we're almost playing the catch-up game on our end. So I'm not saying that we can't do it, it's just that we got to put everything into it. So it would be good for him to come back and train and just be away from the family a little bit.”
Aung La’s invitation to Martin Nguyen shows the kind of communal support and brotherhood that sustains successful fighting careers. Nguyen has been traveling around Asia and visiting family since his last fight in September.
Watch the full interview with Aung La N Sang and SCMP MMA here:
