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Reinier de Ridder weighed in on Arjan Bhullar’s win against Brandon Vera in May 2021.
‘The Dutch Knight’ has plans to become a three-division world champion. Despite defending his light heavyweight world title in the upcoming ONE on Prime Video 5, De Ridder is keeping an eye on the heavyweight division.
The two-division ONE world champion did an interview with SCMP MMA. When asked if he was impressed by current heavyweight titleholder Arjan Bhullar beating Brandon Vera in 2021, he said:
“No, not really. To be frank, he beat Brandon Vera, of course. But Vera was really old already. Not any disrespect to Brandon, but he was far out of his prime. Wasn’t a great win by any stretch of the imagination.”
De Ridder was later asked how Bhullar would look after returning from his long layoff. He responded by saying:
“He never really looked that great, to be honest. So we’ll see.”
Before worrying about the heavyweight division, ‘The Dutch Knight’ has a point to prove against ONE interim heavyweight world champion Anatoliy Malykhin. With a win at ONE on Prime Video 5, De Ridder can defend the light heavyweight crown and show he can beat a world-class heavyweight.
Watch Reinier De Ridder's interview with SCMP MMA below:
Reinier De Ridder thinks Arjan Bhullar is ‘irrelevant’
Reinier De Ridder doesn’t seem to be a huge fan of Arjan Bhullar. ‘Singh’ has been inactive since beating Brandon Vera due to surgery and a contract dispute preventing him from competing in the Circle. During the same SCMP MMA interview, De Ridder had this to say about the ONE heavyweight world champion:
“He keeps talking but I never saw any action from this guy. He’s just irrelevant at the moment. It was fun in the beginning, it was fun to talk some smack about him. He’s not there, so who knows what he’s up to?”
While Bhullar was recovering, Anatoliy Malykhin beat Kirill Grishenko to become interim heavyweight champion. Malykhin is now moving down to light heavyweight to attempt to dethrone De Ridder at ONE on Prime Video 5. It can be watched for free by all Amazon subscribers across North America.
