With the economy stalled in europe and the USA and things heating up in asia, it only makes sense that regional MMA promoters
if not the hotbed of MMA in southeast asia

Eduard folayang from a fans eyeview - reprint

Hey guys, i found this great artcile over at sherdog.net its written by MMAasian and its a great little piece on eduard     "There's been no shortage of articles about Eduard Folayang on this website and I've read the stuff which Anton Tabuena and James Goyder write with interest. However most of what has been written concerns his background and record so I thought it would be good to do a breakdown of his actual fighting style. He has an outstanding 9-1 record and is undeniably one of the top lightweights in Asia. He is also extremely popular in the Philippines and is the highest profile fighter to have ever emerged from a country which has taken to MMA in a big way. Folayang sells tickets, wins fights and is pretty much guaranteed to put on a show for the fans which is why he is headlining One FC's inaugural show. Anyone who has been following these articles will know that I am a big fan of Vuyisile Colossa and I think the Colossa fight showcased the best and worst of Folayang. The best being his relentless will to win and ability to repeatedly take opponents down in a manner more befitting a UCAA wrestler than a Wushu based fighter, the worst being his inability to match Colossa in the stand up exchanges and tendency to become a bit wild with his striking. Here you can see Folayang executing his gameplan to perfection against another MMA fighter with elite level Muay Thai at Martial Combat 4: Martial Combat 4 Fight 1 Eduard Folayang Vs Egon Racz - YouTube Martial Combat 4 Fight 1 Eduard Folayang Vs Egon Racz (via ESPNMartialCombat) It's a bit unfair to single out Folayang's inabaility to beat Colossa in a stand up fight as a weakness because very few MMA fighters in the world, even at a UFC level, would be capable of doing that against a Muay Thai world champion. What I like about Folayang is that he always finds a way to win. Twice I have seen him look like he is going to struggle at the start of a fight and on both occasions he has emerged victorious. This sort of resilience is the stuff of which champions are made and Folayang has it in abundance . If someone wants to beat him they need to either submit him or knock him out, which is what Jon Tuck managed to do when he handed Folayang the only loss of his career. It's very difficult to win a a decision against Folayang because the longer he is inside the cage thee more chance there is he will find a way to impose his wrestling based gameplan and he never, ever gives up. There is no quit in Folayang and he has the experience of having dug deep in the past, in particular when he outpointed unbeaten Chinese Sanda specialist Bao She Ri Gu Leng at Martial Combat 5 despite slipping behind on the scorecards in the opening two rounds. Here you can see him taking control in the last three rounds of that fight: Eduard 'The Landslide' Folayang vs Bao She Ri Gu Leng (part 3) - YouTube Eduard 'The Landslide' Folayang vs Bao She Ri Gu Leng (part 3) (via neilfireballkid) Folayang is certainly no slouch in the stand up department and he has represented the Philippines at Wushu. There is no denying he has the heart of a warrior but sometimes there is a question mark over whether he has the calculating mind of a champion. His default mode seems to be 'swing for the fences' which is fantastic for the fans but could hinder his career when he starts to come up against higher calibre opposition. Personally I view Folayang as a wrestler, albeit one who has a base in Wushu rather than traditional wrestling. If you look at his fighting style from this perspective he is close to being the complete package because he has enough about him to survive standing up and when he says he is not afraid to exchange with an opponent, unlike some wrestlers in the world of MMA, he really means it. Folayang clearly has confidence in his Wushu striking skills but I think he should use his stand up more to set up takedowns than to actually win fights. His ground and pound is very effective and when he puts you on his back, which sooner or later he definitely will, you are in for a world of hurt. He seems to more or less bypass the submission game, he has one rear naked choke win but his game plan is to punish an opponent with strikes once he gets them down rather than seek to submit them. It would be interesting to see whether he could sustain this approach against someone with an elite level of BJJ. If you look at the ten opponents he has faced to date it would probably be fair to say his ground game has yet to be really tested. It's difficult to find any footage on A Sol Kwon but beating him would be a huge achievement for Folayang and I think that, given Kwon has a reputation as being a bit of a banger, the Filipino has a great chance of doing just that. I believe Laursen would have been just as tough an opponent as Kwon, if not tougher, but the key difference is that Folayang will be the underdog against Kwon whereas he would probably have been the favourite against Laursen. This factor should work in his favour as he has less to lose because he is taking on a much more experienced opponent. Both in this fight and future fights much will depend on whether Folayang can show the presence of mind to stick to a sensible game plan. If he goes in with the frame of mind that he will stand and trade with Kwon only for as long as he has to in order to set up the takedown I think he will win a decision. If the game plan goes out the window and he decides to turn it into a kickboxing match then absolutely anything could happen.

A Sol Kwon- "Folayang is Big FIsh in Small Pond"

Sherdog.com: Your opponent on Sept. 3, Folayang, is highly regarded as a prospect. Do you know much about him, and what was your thought when One FC offered you the fight? 

Kwon: It first occurred to me that he would be a great stepping stone for me to move up, sort of like vitamin complex tablets or energy drinks. He is pretty well-known in the region, so he will get as much attention as his opponent, and that’s cool. However, I’m so much better overall, and he will know that he has just been a big fish in a small pond when he fights me on Sept. 3. I already see him returning back to the same small pond after he experiences the reality in the huge ocean of One FC. It’s too bad.


URCC: Say hello to our "leetle" pond Mr. Kwon



welcome to our small

ONE FC revelations - Filipino MMA raises the bar once again

"Folayang will see that all this time he has been a big fish in a small pond when he faces me in One FC, he will see that ONE FC is a big ocean "  this was A Sol Kwon runninng his mouth in the pre fight interview a week before the maiden event of asia's new MMA empressario's maiden show ONE FC.
It would have been nice to have a post fight interview with Kwon (HEAT FC 19-6) asking him what he thought about the pond that Folayang was from - but wait, they dont usually interview  Losers..

With that out of the way, the fight of the night, belonged to the "big fish in the bigger pond" Folayang proved why he is URCC champion (possibly one of the longest runninng MMA promotions in the region ) and also Martial combat superfight champion many times over.
Non-stop aggression, action and damn the torpedoes attitude gave Eduard Folayang (Team lakay wushu ) the judegs nod and a fitting end to the evenings excitement in Singapore.

Eduard Folayang Dominates a Sol Kwon in One FC singapore

URCC"s Eduarad folayang won a UD over a sol kwon of Korea (heat mma) improving his record to 10-1

Eduard Folayang vs Vuyisile Colossa

Eduard Folayang  vs  Vuyisile Colossa part 1

pat 2

par t3

Eduard Folayang vs Bao shi