Marcus ‘Buchecha’ Almeida will be facing an incredibly tough challenge for his third professional MMA fight in the form of the physically imposing Senegalese wrestling champion Oumar ‘Reug Reug’ Kane. The fight has actually been a very long time in the making, as Kane was supposed to be the opponent that would welcome Almeida to the sport of MMA well over a year ago before the plans were scuppered due to injury. Kane moved on and ended up fighting MMA veteran Alain Ngalani instead, winning by knockout in the very first round and moving to 2-0 in his career.
Since then Kane has split his next two fights, registering another first round knockout against Patrick Schmid before being unable to make it past the second round against Kirill Greshenko. Almeida’s professional MMA debut was delayed thanks to the same knee injury that forced him out of the fight against Kane, but he still managed to make it in the ONE Championship cage in the end. He took on elite kickboxer Anderson ‘Braddock’ Silva and managed to finish the fight in the very first round with a north-south choke after some devastating knees from the top.
Almeida wasted no time at all though in making his return to the cage as he took on undefeated Korean knockout artist Kang Ji Won in his second fight, only to register another first round submission win. All signs point to Almeida enjoying a successful MMA career at ONE Championship in the future as his elite grappling skills seem to hold up well when strikes are involved. He will never have faced a fighter capable of presenting as much of a physical challenge as Kane is though, and this will be a tough test for him as he attempts to work his way to a world title.
The full ONE: Reloaded event, including Marcus ‘Buchecha’ Almeida v Oumar ‘Reug Reug’ Kane, will be available to watch live on April 22nd on the ONE Championship YouTube Channel, click here to watch.
