Garry Tonon will be making his return to MMA for the first time in over a year, and he’ll be doing so for a rematch with Shamil Gasanov. The fight has just been booked for ONE Fight Night 34 on August 1st, 2025 and it will have big implications for the ONE Championship featherweight title-picture. The pair first met around two years ago at ONE Fight Night 12, back when Gasanov was an undefeated prospect on the rise and Tonon was working his way back to the top after an unsuccessful first title-shot that ended with him suffering the first loss of his MMA career.
Both men had their moments of success in the first fight but it was Tonon who came away with the win after rolling through for a slick kneebar entry to submit Gasanov. That was one of the most impressive submission finishes of the year in MMA and Tonon wasted no time either, getting a first-round submission win over former champion Martin Nguyen in his very next fight. Gasanov didn’t slow down either though, as he got back in the win-column in the same month at the beginning of 2024. Where Tonon has been absent from MMA since then though, Gasanov has been hard at work to climb back up the rankings.
Gasanov has won three more fights since then to make it a four-fight winning streak, including his most recent victory over Nguyen. That means that he now actually holds a longer streak than Tonon and is ranked above him in their division. With Tang Kai as the reigning champion who is coming off a loss to Akbar Abdullaev in a non-title bout after Abdullaev missed weight, there’s a clear title-fight in the making there. Gasanov is ranked third though so a win over Tonon could put him next in line for a shot at the belt, while Tonon may well find himself in the same position if he emerges victorious.
ONE Championship announced the news that Garry Tonon would be returning to MMA for a rematch with Shamil Gasanov in a recent post to their official Instagram account:
