Magomedov Missed Weight by Five Pounds, Then Took Gabriel’s Main Event on a Split Card

BANGKOK

Friday in Bangkok was a double shift for ONE Championship, and the nightcap refused to be tidy. Hours after Tye Ruotolo took Christian Lee’s lightweight title on the promotion’s afternoon card at Lumpinee Stadium, ONE Fight Night 49 closed the building in U.S. primetime on Prime Video — nine bouts across MMA, Muay Thai, kickboxing and submission grappling, ending with a main event the judges could not agree on and a winner who had already lost once this week, on the scale.

Magomedov missed the weight, then won the fight

Magomed Magomedov arrived at Friday’s official weigh-in at 175.4 pounds for a lightweight bout contracted at 170. Lucas Gabriel made 167.8. Per ONE Championship’s weigh-in and hydration release, Magomedov forfeited 30 percent of his purse to Gabriel and the fight went ahead at a catchweight of 175.4 pounds. It was not the start a promotional debutant wants — Magomedov, unbeaten at 15-0, had stepped in for the injured Alibeg Rasulov, and ONE billed the winner as a candidate for the next lightweight title opportunity.

Then he won anyway, the hard way. Over three rounds Gabriel landed the cleaner damage — all three judges scored the striking slightly for the Brazilian on the official scorecards published by FightBook MMA from ONE’s judge sheets — but two of the three scored the fight for Magomedov on the strength of his takedowns and ground control. Judge Jeremy Saunders had Gabriel, on moderate damage. Judges Ian Cartwright and Khaliun Battulga had Magomedov, each crediting him a moderate edge in takedowns. Under ONE’s whole-bout judging criteria, that was enough: a split decision, a 16-0 record, and a debut win that will be argued about precisely because the scorecards show exactly why it happened. Gabriel, who told the promotion beforehand that a win should earn him a title shot, falls to 11-2 — and the belt he was chasing changed hands earlier the same day, when Ruotolo submitted Lee in 128 seconds. That story is in Friday’s earlier fight roundup.

A three-year-old score, settled by one left hook

The co-main event was a rematch three years in the making. Kongthoranee Sor Sommai beat Taiki Naito under Muay Thai rules in 2023; on Friday they ran it back under flyweight kickboxing rules, and for two and a half rounds it was as close as the first meeting. Then, according to ONE Championship’s official report, Naito clipped Kongthoranee with a third-round left hook and put him down. The Thai beat the count, but the knockdown sealed every card: 29-27, three times, for Naito. The win is his fourth straight, moves him to 40-14, and, per ONE, puts him in the running for the vacant ONE flyweight kickboxing world title.

Lee survives the scare, then ends it

The best finish of the night belonged to Lee Seung Cheol. The South Korean strawweight spent most of the first round underneath Nazareth Lalthazuala, who hunted submissions and, per ONE’s report, came close to a choke of his own. Lee survived, came back harder in the second, trapped Lalthazuala against the ropes with ground-and-pound, then took his back in the scramble and finished the rear-naked choke at 3:04 of round two. It is the first loss of Lalthazuala’s career. Lee moves to 14-1 overall — MiddleEasy noted his ONE record now stands at 7-0 in the promotion — and ONE’s own report floated what comes next: strawweight champion Joshua Pacio defends against Keito Yamakita at ONE SAMURAI 5 on November 18, and Lee just made himself very hard to keep out of that conversation.

Nine years, 95 seconds

Victor Hugo waited nearly a decade to settle his trilogy with Devhonte Johnson, and then needed barely a minute and a half. The seven-time BJJ world champion and reigning ADCC champion foot-swept Johnson, took his back and locked in a rear-naked choke at 1:35 of the first round of their openweight submission grappling bout, per ONE’s report. The rivalry began when Hugo won their first meeting at the 2016 IBJJF Worlds as purple belts; Johnson took the rematch at the 2017 Europeans. The rubber match was not close, and it moved Hugo’s grappling record to 101-23.

The card’s other unbeaten records mostly survived. Magdalena Czaban outpointed Vick Souza unanimously in atomweight MMA to reach 6-0, her second straight ONE win, and Ilmadi Israilov took a unanimous decision over Kalandar Tabarov in the bantamweight opener to go 10-0 in his debut — even after an accidental kick to the face of the grounded Tabarov cost him a yellow card, per ONE’s report.

The rest of the striking card

Nontachai Jitmuangnon made it two straight over Felipe Lobo, rallying from a punishing first round to take their bantamweight Muay Thai rematch by unanimous decision (29-28, 30-27, 30-27) and move to 54-23, per ONE’s striking recap; he first beat the former two-time title challenger at ONE Fight Night 43, six months ago. Zhou Jiaqiang earned his first ONE win the tightest way available, a split decision over Mamuka Usubyan with two cards of 29-28, moving to 21-7. And Bogdan Shumarov swept Gasham Mammadov 30-27 on all three cards to reach 20-3 — the second weight miss of the card, after Mammadov came in at 173 pounds and, per ONE’s weigh-in release, forfeited 25 percent of his purse before losing every round anyway.

The full card, in ONE’s official order: Magomedov def. Gabriel, split decision; Naito def. Kongthoranee, unanimous decision; Lee def. Lalthazuala, submission (rear-naked choke), round two; Nontachai def. Lobo, unanimous decision; Zhou def. Usubyan, split decision; Czaban def. Souza, unanimous decision; Shumarov def. Mammadov, unanimous decision; Hugo def. Johnson, submission (rear-naked choke), round one; Israilov def. Tabarov, unanimous decision.

Also on Friday night

SYDNEY — Paul Gallen has confirmed what Friday’s first-round knockout in Sydney made obvious. In comments reported by Fox Sports Australia from hospital, where he was taken for checks after Nelson Asofa-Solomona stopped him in one round, Gallen said: “Well, it’s official; Father Time is undefeated, and that’s it for me.” Fox Sports Australia reported Gallen added that the hospital checks found no issues. His final record stands at 16-3-1, closing a 20-fight career that began in 2014. The fight itself is covered in our Sydney report.

LAS VEGAS — Saturday’s UFC Vegas 124 card at the Meta Apex is fully official. Sherdog and BJPenn both reported a clean sweep at Friday’s weigh-ins: all 28 fighters made weight, headlined by Waldo Cortes-Acosta at 262 pounds and Johnny Walker at 239 — a 23-pound gap in a heavyweight main event that was rebuilt on nine days’ notice, with Tatiana Suarez (115.5) and Virna Jandiroba (116) set in the strawweight co-main. The main card starts at 8 p.m. ET on Paramount+. Saturday’s card is previewed in the earlier roundup.