“Dude literally broke his soul” - The moment Anatoly Malykhin snatched Reinier de Ridder’s spirit at ONE 166

Russian juggernaut Anatoly Malykhin made history at ONE 166: Qatar, dispatching Reinier de Ridder to become the first-ever three-division MMA world champion in ONE Championship.

Going into the bout already carrying the undisputed light heavyweight and heavyweight MMA world titles, Malykhin set his sights on 'RDR’s' middleweight belt in a rematch of their main event clash at ONE on Prime Video 5 more than a year ago. In that bout, de Ridder went down in the opening round.

This time, he showed significant improvement, but ultimately came up short, surrendering to ‘Sladkiy’ in round three:

“MAKING HISTORY 🏆 Anatoly Malykhin stops Reinier de Ridder to become the first three-division MMA World Champion!”

Fans on Instagram shared their excitement over Anatoly Malykhin’s spectacular showing at Lusail Sports Arena, writing:

“BEAST MODE 🔥that’s how you take a 3rd belt, make the man quit”

“Made him quit on the mat 👏🔥”

“Dude literally broke his soul”

“He looked super nervous before the fight even started”

“History made 🔥🔥🔥”

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What’s next for Anatoly Malykhin?

Now the owner of 78 pounds of ONE Championship gold, everyone is curious to know what will come next for Anatoly Malykhin.

In all likelihood, he will return to heavyweight for a meeting with one of two potential opponents — Senegalese wrestling standout Oumar ‘Reug Reug’ Kane, or Iranian powerhouse Amir Aliakbari.

Aliakbari earned a disqualification victory over former heavyweight MMA king Arjan Bhullar at ONE 166 after ‘Singh’ failed to engage for the majority of the contest. He was DQ’d with 45 seconds left in a fight that Aliakbari was sure to win had it been allowed to go to the scorecards.

If you missed any of the action or want to relive an epic night in ONE Championship history, the ONE 166: Qatar replay can be watched on demand via Amazon Prime Video.