SHANGHAI, April 8, 2024 – ONE Championship, an internationally renowned sports IP, has announced that Zhang Lipeng and Hu Yong will compete in "ONE: Summit Series 22" on 4 May. "The Golden Wing" Zhang Lipeng will take on Swiss sensation Maurice Abevi in a lightweight mixed martial arts bout. Chinese fighter Hu Yong, currently ranked fifth in the flyweight mixed martial arts rankings, will challenge Jiu-Jitsu superstar Reece McLaren in the fourth division.
Zhang was originally scheduled to face Abbevi at "ONE Summit Series 18" in January, but the bout was postponed for a few months due to some unexpected factors. This gives both sides more time to prepare. This is Zhang's fifth fight in ONE Championship, and he has a 3-1 record. Zhang Lipeng made his debut three-round debut with a three-round victory over former Lightweight World Champion Eduard "Landslide" Folayang, followed by a lightning-fast 32-second knockout of Ruslan Emilbek Uulu for a US$50,000 performance bonus. Despite losing the decision to wrestling sensation Saygid Izagakhmaev, Zhang soon returned to the Circle with a strong punch at "ONE: Pinnacle Series 15" to knockout Russian sensation Timofey Nastyukhin in 3:18 to earn another US$50,000 performance bonus.
The 24-year-old enters ONE Championship with a perfect 6-0 record and 100 percent finishing. In "ONE: Pinnacle Series 9," Abevi lost by decision to Halil Amir in his ONE debut. In "ONE: Pinnacle Series 14," Abevi scored a TKO of Blake Cooper in just 4:36. Abewei has comprehensive technology, compared with Zhang Lipeng, he has a height advantage of 4 cm, nearly ten years younger, and he is not good.
Hu Yong needed just 63 seconds to TKO Indonesian Wrestling Champion Eko Roni Saputra at "ONE: Pinnacle Series 15" to make it to the top five flyweight rankings after winning three straight victories in ONE Championship. To move further up the rankings, he prepares to challenge McLaren, who is fourth in the division.
McLaren is a master of the jiu-jitsu grappling style. The Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt is a former XFC and Eternal MMA bantamweight champion, and a longtime top-five top-five fighter, McLaren once defeated China's Xie Wei by submission in one round. Hu Yong has shown great striking skills in his past fights, but he has never faced a top jiu-jitsu master. The two sides have different styles, which brings suspense to the game. Hu Yong has been preparing for the first victory of 2024 at the Xinjiang training base in Pattaya, Thailand. "McLaren is one of my target opponents. Because his Jiu-Jitsu level and overall strength are very strong, I want to be a champion and I have to beat this kind of Jiu-Jitsu top fighter. ”