Another exciting card came to a close this past weekend, which saw at least a couple of divisions find tough challengers calling for their shot at gold. Last Friday, May 3 ONE Fight Night 22: Sundell vs Diachkova was capped off by a beautiful come-from-behind win by Swedish striking sensation Smilla “The Hurricane” Sundell over the hard-hitting Natalia “Karelian Lynx” Diachkova to the delight of fans in attendance at the Lumpinee Boxing Stadium in Bangkok, Thailand.

“The Hurricane” came into fight week with designs of retaining her ONE Women’s Strawweight Muay Thai World Title against her Russian challenger. Unfortunately, she failed to meet the contracted weight and lost her belt on the scales.

Thrilling developments at the ONE Fight Night 22

The World Title bout became a catchweight match with Diachkova the only person eligible to win the coveted strap that night. “Karelian Lynx” looked fully motivated to come home with 26.5 pounds of gold draped on her shoulder as she unloaded on Sundell early on. Her signature bombs, which knocked out three of her first four opponents in the world’s largest martial arts organization, landed with pinpoint accuracy and dealt visible damage to the 19-year-old.

However, Sundell proved why she was the queen of the division in the first place, as she withstood the punishment and dished out heavy counters of her own through the first two rounds. In the third, the Fairtex Training Center product landed a huge uppercut to the body that Diachkova didn’t initially appear to feel, but she ultimately folded near the ropes, where Sundell unloaded until the referee put a stop to the contest.

Following the match, Sundell admitted that she couldn’t really see very well in her left eye but powered through because she was determined to win. Speaking to ONE commentator Mitch Chilson after the match, she shared the roller coaster of emotions she had through the weekend.

“It was a lot of feelings,” she said. “I was very sad, I worked very hard for it, but it just didn’t come off. It was kind of a short fight camp, and I was very stressed throughout the whole thing. I think I can do it (fight for strawweight gold) again. But what I want the most is another weight division.”

In the co-main event, Akbar “Bakal” Abdullaev continued to roll with a second-round destruction of Halil Amir in their featherweight MMA tussle. The Kyrgyz warrior was not scared to mix it up with his Turkish foe on their feet and the ground, as he employed a rarely-seen wrestling game to take control of the match in the first round. In the second, “Bakal” connected with his left hand and sent Amir to the ground, which earned him his third straight bonus in as many fights in ONE. After his win, he called out ONE Featherweight MMA World Champion Tang Kai, saying he was ready to take the belt from him.

Full list of results of ONE Fight Night 22

Here are the full results of ONE Fight Night 22:

Smilla “The Hurricane” Sundell defeats Natalia “Karelian Lynx” Diachkova via TKO at 2:59 of round two (126.5lbs Catchweight Muay Thai)

Featherweight MMA
Akbar Abdullaev defeats Halil “No Mercy” Amir via knockout at 2:52 of round two

Lightweight Muay Thai
Dmitry Menshikov defeats Sinsamut Klinmee via knockout at 1:33 of round three

Maurice Abevi defeats “The Warrior” Zhang Lipeng via unanimous decision (174lbs Catchweight MMA)

Wei Rui defeats Hiroki Akimoto via unanimous decision (Bantamweight Kickboxing)

Reece “Lightning” McLaren defeats “Wolf Warrior” Hu Yong via split decision (Flyweight MMA)

Rungrawee “Legatron” Sitsongpeenong defeats Bogdan Shumarov via split decision (Lightweight Kickboxing)

Chihiro Sawada defeats Noelle “Lil’ Monkey” Grandjean via unanimous decision (Atomweight MMA)

Zakaria El Jamari defeats Thongpoon PK Saenchai via unanimous decision (Strawweight Muay Thai)

Bianca Basilio defeats Nanami Ichikawa via submission (rear-naked choke) at 0:35 of round one (132lbs Catchweight Submission Grappling)

Sean Climaco defeats Josue “Tuzo” Cruz via knockout at 2:06 of round one (Flyweight Muay Thai)