“Be more patient and pick your shots” - Martin Nguyen reveals advice he would have given Thanh Le for Tang Kai fight

Thanh Le’s featherweight world title reign and undefeated streak came to an end in the co-main event of ONE 160 on August 26. After five straight wins by knockout, Le could not overcome the power and precision of China’s first male MMA world champion, Tang Kai.

Tang delivered a masterful performance over the course of 25 minutes and walked away with his first piece of ONE gold for his efforts. Chiming in on the result of the bout was former two-division world champion Martin Nguyen, who criticized Le’s patience, or lack thereof, while speaking to ONE Championship.

“I don’t know what he did all camp, so I can’t really be there to judge what type of style he was fighting, but if I was there to tell him what to do, I’d say just be more patient and pick your shots, as Tang Kai was coming forward.”

Nguyen believes that if Le had shown more patience, he would have forced Tang Kai to engage, opening him up to a counter-attack, which is typically Le’s bread and butter.

“I feel that if he was more patient, he would have been able to force that aggression out of Tang Kai. Obviously, he’s got pinpoint accuracy with his shots, and his shots do hurt.”

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Martin Nguyen was impressed with Tang Kai’s performance against Thanh Le at ONE 160

At ONE: Inside the Matrix is 2020, Martin Nguyen lost the ONE featherweight world title to Le via a third-round knockout.

Fully aware of the power that Le possesses, ‘The Situ-Asian’ was very impressed by Tang Kai’s picture-perfect performance against Le in their ONE 160 co-main clash.

“I thought it was a tremendous performance [from Tang]. Some people can say I’m completely wrong, but how I saw it was the exact same fight when I fought Thanh Le. Thanh Le was the Tang Kai, and I was Thanh Le in that recent fight... I would come pressuring forward with strikes, and he would evade, set up strikes, set up traps, and tag me along the way. And that’s exactly what Tang Kai did to Le.”