Redemption is on Edward Kelly's mind right now. The young and budding mixed martial artist was on a five-fight winning streak when he got a call to fight under the One Fighting Championship banner last year. On December 6 of that year, he entered the ONE FC cage for the first time. It was supposed to be his ticket to bigger things. Fate however had a different path for him as he got submitted in the very first round by Herbert Burns of Brazil. It was a devastating loss indeed.
Fast forward to the present time. Kelly is in the same spot but with more at stake. He will be co-headlining the next ONE FC event which will be held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on October 17. He will be facing Ev Ting (7-2-0) who just debuted in the ONE FC last June with an impressive knockout win over Yohan Mulia Legowo of Indonesia.
More is at stake here because of the fact that Kelly can't afford to lose this fight. As an MMA fighter, you don't want to lose twice in a row under the same organization. Not only does your stock and drawing power slide back, you also run the risk of being cut from the promotion.
The main event for Roar of Tigers is a fight between Rob Lisita of Australia and Marat Gafurov of Russia. Lisita is coming off a loss to Eric Kelly (Edward Kelly's older brother) back in July. Gafurov who has been fighting for the last several years under M-1 Global will be making his ONE FC debut.