BJJ-esset Garry Tonon tror att en vinst till i ONE Championship blir hans biljett till en titelchans.
Sedan BJJ-esset Garry Tonon sadlade om från grappling till MMA har han skaffat sig ett record på 5-0 med tre submissions och två matcher som slutade i TKO. Av hans motståndare har dessutom bara en tagit sig till tredje ronden med honom.
Hans förra vinst var över Yoshiki Nakahara förra maj och det verkade som om Tonon var på god väg mot en titelchans i ONE Championship. COVID-19 pandemin satte dock käppar i hjulen för honom då alla tävlingar har ställts in under året. Så här sa han till MMA Fighting om situationen.
“I’ve still been training and preparing,”
“I’ve been sparring and all these different things for fighting. MMA has been my main focus for a while now. I never stopped training. I did some grappling matches but I was doing mixed martial arts the entire time. It’s not like it was completely layoff from training but from fighting.
“It was a difficult thing. I worked out a new contract and that took some time. Then we scheduled a fight and we ended up scheduling it right at the beginning of when they had to cancel events because of COVID. The timing was just poor. I was getting ready to fight in March and that’s when everything got shut down.”
Ingen vill möta Tonon
På fredag får han dock chansen att tävla igen då han möter den före detta titelutmanaren Koyomi Matsushima på ONE: Big Bang i Singapore. Det har dessutom tagit tid att få till en bra matching åt Tonon då det varit svårt att hitta folk som vill möta honom.
“I know people are hesitant to fight me because of my record. I only have five fights,”
“But it’s like this fight is going to happen, I’m going to be there challenging for the title. I’m going to be up there with these guys. Now is the time to fight me. You’d rather fight me now than in two years. ”
“In two years, I’m going to be much better. Is everyone getting better? Sure, I wouldn’t disagree with that but there’s no way somebody that’s been doing this for a decade can get better at the same rate as somebody who’s only been doing this for three years. It’s just impossible.”
”The Lion Killer” hoppas och tror att en vinst över Matsushima ska ge honom en chans att gå om titeln i fjädervikt mot den nuvarande mästaren Thanh Le.
“I’m now actually going to be fighting somebody who’s fought for the title, I think it’s not debatable anymore,”
“If I’m fighting the guy who had the opportunity and I beat him, especially in a convincing way, I don’t see how anybody could deny ‘hey this guy should get a shot.’”
Det är alltid lite oklart vem som står på tur för nästa titelchans då sådant kan svänga på en femöring, men en vinst mot Matsushima borde åtminstone sätta Tonon i konversationen om en titelchans.
