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Marcus 'Buchecha' Almeida has had some rough luck with fights recently. The Brazilian has seen five bouts cancelled in the last two years.
The Brazilian was supposed to be in action on the last couple of ONE Championship cards against Oumar Kane and then Hugo Cunha before the match-up fell off at the last minute.
The ONE matchmakers even secured Jasur Mirzamukhamedov to fill in at the eleventh hour but, like Cunha, 'White Tiger' tested positivie for Covid-19 before arriving in Singapore.
It's rumoured that Buchecha will finally get to throw down at the upcoming event - ONE 158: Pacio vs. Brooks after he made a post saying that he'll 'be back in two weeks.'
Check out the Instagram post below:
Meanwhile, the BJJ icon has stayed sharp over in Thailand. As well as training at Phuket Fight Club, the IBBJF Hall of Famer stopped by the famed Tiger Muay Thai gym.
It was here that he bumped into ONE interim heavyweight champion Anatoly Malykhin. The Russian swiftly offered to have a grappling match with the ATT legend.
Tagging ONE Championship CEO and founder Chatri Sityodtong on his Instagram story, the champ said:
"Hey my brother! How are you bro? Let's go bro. Me and you. jiu-jitsu."
ONE has increased its number of submission grappling matches of late and has signed some of the top BJJ talents on the planet. However, Almeida has insisted that he's very keen to keep the momentum going in his MMA career.
Despite showing immense ability inside the circle with two straight wins via stoppage, the 32-year-old has only competed in those two fights so far for a total of less than six minutes.
Who should Buchecha fight next?
The answer at this stage is really anyone. The man needs to fight. He says he doesn't want to rush towards a title shot, but having come into MMA late on in his career, he also doesn't have an awful lot of time to waste.
Almeida has already proven he can hang with some of the best in the division. Kang Ji Won has been knocking people out for fun, but Almeida made light work of him.
It would not be surprising to see Buchecha thrust into the title picture if he can get one more good win on his record. At that point, he could soon be on a collision course with Malykhin, who's expected to face Arjan Bhullar in a title unification match.
