Lito Adiwang believes Adrian Mattheis will push him to his limit: “It’s a good motivation”

Eighteen months removed from his last bout against Filipino compatriot Jeremy Miado at ONE X in March 2022, where he suffered a second-round TKO loss and sustained an ACL injury, Lito Adiwang is ready to reclaim his place in the top-five rankings of the strawweight MMA division.

The ‘Thunder Kid’ will be facing ONE Championship veteran Adrian Mattheis in the opening bout of the ONE Friday Fights 34 on September 22 inside the iconic Lumpinee Boxing Stadium in Bangkok, Thailand. It will be Adiwang’s 10th bout under the world’s largest martial arts organization since his debut in February 2019 in ONE Warrior Series.

In his recent talk with The MMA Superfan on their YouTube channel, Adiwang acknowledged the tough challenge that Mattheirs will present because ‘Papua Badboy’s’ is a dangerous opponent with an 89% finish rate.

But the Filipino slugger isn’t fazed by this hard test ahead because he knows that it will push him to be a better fighter, as the 30-year-old said:

“That’s a challenge for me because this fighter is a strong opponent for me, so it’s a good motivation to bring out the best in me.”

This is not the first time that the HIIT Studio representative has been pitted against dangerous opponents; in fact, he has already fought some of the top contenders in the 125-pound division, like Senzo Ikeda, Pongsiri Mitsatit, Hiroba Minowa, Jeremy Miado, and even current ONE strawweight MMA world champion Jarred Brooks.

Adiwang wants to use the valuable lessons and experiences he’s had from the mixed results he got from fighting the aforementioned fighters to get a favorable result against the Indonesian in the curtain-opener fight of the card.

ONE Friday Fights is available for free weekly on ONE Championship’s official YouTube page.