"It's gonna be the biggest in history" - ONE Championship CEO Chatri Sityodtong sees 18-20 fights happening at ONE X

ONE Championship is setting up its historic 10th year event, ONE X. [Photos: @yodchatri, @angelaleemma, @mighty, @moraesadrianomma on Instagram]
ONE Championship is setting up its historic 10th year event, ONE X. [Photos: @yodchatri, @angelaleemma, @mighty, @moraesadrianomma on Instagram]

ONE Championship is expected to go all out and spare no expense for its 10th anniversary show ONE X on March 26.

Although the promotion's CEO Chatri Sityodtong is understandably keeping a lot of things under wraps for now, he dropped numerous details at The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani on January 12.

Only three fights have been revealed so far, headed by Angela Lee's ONE women's atomweight title defense main event against Stamp Fairtex.

Demetrious Johnson will face Rodtang Jitmuangnon in a special-rules fight, while Adriano Moraes will defend his flyweight title against Yuya Wakamatsu.

Sityodtong told Helwani that these three star-studded bouts are just "the tip of the iceberg" for ONE Championship's 10th year celebration:

"It's gonna be the biggest in history. We're gonna have tons of fights. I think we're gonna have 18 or 20 fights and it's gonna go all day. It will be a big bonanza with all the big stars coming up."

Bibiano Fernandes was even originally slated to defend his bantamweight belt against John Lineker in the ONE X super-event. However, Sityodtong decided the wait would have been too long for the two heated rivals:

"Bibi was out because we were in contract negotiations and things didn't go well until they did go well in the end for everybody. We got Bibi to fight right away rather than have him wait, right? Let's get it on. It's one of those things where the timing worked out and you could do it earlier."

Clearly the ONE Championship anniversary event will be big enough even without Fernandes and Lineker. Sityodtong instead put the two warring Brazilians as the headliners for ONE: Bad Blood on February 11.

For now, only a handful of other fighters have been tapped for the event. They are also some of the biggest names in combat sports today including Eddie Alvarez, Sage Northcutt, Shinya Aoki and Eduard Folayang.


ONE Championship X shaping up to be promotion's biggest pandemic event, biggest card since ONE: Century

ONE Championship is also hoping that more fans will be allowed in for an event of ONE X's caliber. During his interview with Ariel Helwani, Chatri Sityodtong said the promotion is looking for a full house inside the 12,000-seater Singapore Indoor Stadium.

If local crowd restrictions do get relaxed by the end of March, fans will be treated to the biggest ONE event since the 22-fight ONE: Century mega-card at the famed Ryogoku Kokugikan arena in Japan back in 2019.

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