Song Yadong

The finish mattered because it came against another former champion and showed that his threat is not limited to striking exchanges.

Key moments

• Submitted Figueiredo with a guillotine choke in round two.
• Closed the finish at 4:42 of the second frame.
• Collected another marquee bantamweight win.

Song controlled his own main event well against Gutierrez and handled the full five rounds without losing structure. The unanimous decision showed he could headline, manage pace and still keep the sharper moments on his side.

Key moments

• Won a five-round unanimous decision in a main event.
• Managed a full 25-minute bantamweight fight effectively.
• Used the performance to stay planted in the contender tier.

Song's first UFC main event ended in frustration when a bad cut over his eye forced a doctor stoppage after four rounds against Cory Sandhagen.

Key moments

• Lost by doctor stoppage at the end of round four in Las Vegas.
• The bout marked Song's first UFC headliner.
• It halted the three-fight surge that had included wins over Marlon Moraes, Julio Arce and Casey Kenney.

Song made a clean statement against former title challenger Marlon Moraes by flattening him with punches in the first round.

Key moments

• Knocked out Moraes 2:06 into the opening round at the Apex.
• The finish gave Song his first UFC win of 2022.
• It set up the September main event with Cory Sandhagen.

Song followed the Kenney decision with a sharper finish, hurting Julio Arce with a head kick and swarming to a second-round stoppage. The result mattered because it reminded people that his boxing was not his only danger and gave him back-to-back wins after the Kyler Phillips setback.

Key moments

• Stopped Arce at 1:35 of round two after landing the head kick.
• The win followed the split decision over Casey Kenney three months earlier.
• It gave Song consecutive victories heading into the Moraes fight.

Song and Cody Stamann fought to a majority draw in Washington, D. C. , after Stamann was deducted a point for an accidental eye poke in the second round.

Key moments

• Fought Stamann to a majority draw after three rounds.
• A point deduction against Stamann for an accidental eye poke shaped the final scoring.
• Song stayed in a competitive UFC bantamweight matchup without taking a loss.

The result reinforced that his boxing-led pressure could still produce highlight finishes when opponents tried to survive late in rounds.

Key moments

• Finished Arantes with an elbow at 4:59 of the second round.
• Closed the fight in the final second of the frame in Singapore.
• Backed up his successful debut with another emphatic UFC stoppage.

Song made the right first impression in his UFC debut by hurting Bharat Khandare on the feet and then jumping on a guillotine choke for the first-round submission in Shanghai. The win was an immediate statement because it came on short notice and showed he was more than a young striker with fast hands.

Key moments

• Won his UFC debut by first-round guillotine choke at 4:16.
• Dropped Khandare before locking up the submission finish.
• Opened his UFC tenure with a finish in front of the Shanghai crowd.

That mattered because it showed he could bank rounds cleanly against a seasoned opponent instead of relying only on early violence.

Key moments

• Skrivers came in with a much deeper résumé than many of Song's earlier opponents and kept fighting at a respectable level after this loss.
• The fight gave Song a different kind of win between his two Renat Ondar losses and the later Makoto Yoshida stoppage.
• Against a more experienced opponent, the clearest verified story is that Song stayed composed for the full 15 minutes and won the cards.

Song's title-fight rematch with Renat Ondar stretched to five rounds, but the result was the same: Ondar's experience and steadier work earned another unanimous decision.

Key moments

• Ondar had already beaten Song once in October 2016, so this was a second attempt to solve the same opponent in a higher-stakes setting.
• Ondar followed this period by beating Jinensibieke Asikeerbai and Bato Damdinov before landing on the Fight Nights Global circuit.
• The cleanest verified takeaway is that Song was competitive enough to go 25 minutes, but not enough to change the judges' read from the first meeting.

Song ran into a much more seasoned opponent in Alexey Polpudnikov and paid for it with a second-round knockout at Kunlun Fight 44. The loss aged reasonably well because Polpudnikov was a battle-tested veteran who kept beating strong opposition across ACB and other major Eurasian promotions afterward.

Key moments

• Polpudnikov already owned wins in Road FC and Russian pankration circuits before this bout and later added notable victories over Donald Sanchez and Arman Ospanov.
• The result gave Song another early lesson against an opponent with far more professional depth than most of his local assignments.
• Even after the knockout loss, Song answered well by stopping Vachagan Nikogosyan in his very next documented fight.

Song showed a different finishing touch against Artak Nazaryan, ending the fight with a body-shot knockout less than a minute into the second round. The win was useful because Nazaryan was an experienced submission-heavy veteran, which meant Song was not simply icing novices with one clean punch.

Key moments

• Nazaryan entered with a deeper professional résumé and a style built heavily around submissions, making him a more meaningful regional test.
• Nazaryan's later loss to Jiacai Zhang and earlier fight with Zabit Magomedsharipov help place him in a stronger talent pool than a typical local opponent.
• The stoppage also highlighted that Song's finishing game already included body work and not just headhunting combinations.

The important point is not a technical takeaway so much as the fact that Song had already been booked against a legitimate international opponent on an M-1 card before his twentieth birthday.

Key moments

• Moljo was a seasoned Australian veteran whose résumé included fights across BRACE, One FC and other regional promotions.
• Because the loss came by foul rather than by being outclassed in open play, it reads differently from Song's later decision defeats to Renat Ondar or Ji Xian.
• It still counted as a meaningful developmental night because Song was already sharing cards with more experienced international talent.

Song's majority decision over Zhao Yafei was one of his more useful early distance wins because Zhao stayed active long after the loss and kept fighting internationally. Instead of another quick finish, Song had to prove he could edge a credible opponent over three full rounds.

Key moments

• Zhao later fought across WLF, Kunlun Fight and other regional promotions, which gives this win more substance than a one-off local result.
• The fight came on the RUFF Fu card, where Baasankhuu Damnlanpurev also stopped Heili Alateng later the same night.
• Against a durable opponent, the clearest verified takeaway is that Song stayed composed for 15 minutes and found enough rounds to get the nod.