Brandon Vera looks for redemption in ONE 164

By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

The former Filipino-American heavyweight king is back.

After 19 months of absence in ONE Fighting Championship, Brandon Vera will finally make his highly-anticipated return and will face Aliakbari Amir in ONE 164 on December 3, 2022.

Vera’s comeback fight will be staged in front of his Filipino fans at the SM Mall of Asia Arena and is seeking to bounce back after two straight defeats during his last fights.

The former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) contender lost at the hands of the crafty Aung La N Sang via stoppage and suffered the same fate against Arjan Bhullar.

Before absorbing back-to-back losses, Vera was the most dominant heavyweight fighter and scored four-consecutive knockout wins in a span of four years.

Vera redeemed himself last December 2014 when he won via technical knockout against Igor Subora and extended his streak of knockouts against Paul Cheng, Hideki Sekine, and Mauro Cerilli.

ONE Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Chatri Sityodtong confirmed the development and announced Vera’s fight on CNN Sportsdesk.

Vera will boost his chances of another ONE heavyweight fight ticket if he manages to pile up a winning streak like what he did when he racked up four wins in a row to capture the crown.

Meanwhile, his opponent, the hard-hitting big man from Iran, currently holds an 11-3 win-loss record and is also coming off an impressive win against one of Vera’s casualties in Cerilli.

Aliakbari is looking to extend his winning streak to two wins and will have a big fish to catch in Vera if he wants to go up the heavyweight rankings.

The Vera-Aliakbari heavyweight clash will be an undercard fight between the current ONE strawweight champion Joshua Pacio and challenger Jarred Brooks’ main event.