Today, the legendary Tyrone Spong makes his long-awaited return to combat sports. After more than three years of absence, he takes on UFC veteran “Smilen” Sam Alvey tonight for the Karate Combat Heavyweight title in the main event of KC 54. The event takes place in Dubai, UAE, and has an interesting fight card on the schedule.

Tyrone Spong is no stranger to the combat sports world. More than a decade ago, he already achieved great success in kickboxing, where he fought the best fighters in the world in Japan during his K-1 days. In 2013, Spong became the GLORY Light-Heavyweight Tournament champion. Unfortunately, his career suffered a major setback when he suffered a broken leg during the rematch against Gökhan Saki in a fight for the GLORY LHW title. Nevertheless, Tyrone ended his kickboxing career with an impressive record of 107-7 (73 KO).

Spong then switched to professional boxing, where he quickly made his mark by knocking out everyone he faced. This provided him with great opportunities, including fights against top fighters such as Oleksandr Usyk, Andy Ruiz Jr. and Andrew Tabiti. Unfortunately, all of these fights ultimately fell through, which was a big disappointment, as this could have been Spong's breakthrough on the world boxing stage.

Tyrone's last boxing match took place in 2019, and his record remains undefeated at 13-0 (12 KO). After more than three years without action, Spong returned in 2022 for an MMA fight against Russian veteran Sergei Kharitonov, but unfortunately he lost that fight. Now, three and a half years later, he is making his comeback, taking on Karate Combat Heavyweight champion Sam Alvey, and if he wins, “King of the Ring” can add another fine title to his already impressive collection.

In the evening's co-main event, former UFC Flyweight contender Muhammad Mokaev will make his Karate Combat debut against Kazakh fighter Bolat Zamanbekov. Two guys best known for their grappling, but now face each other in the striking-oriented ruleset of Karate Combat. In addition, UFC Lightweight contender Arman Tsarukyan will appear on the card for a grappling bout in the Karate Combat Pit Submission Series. Tsarukyan will take on Makkasharip Zaynukov, a teammate of UFC Lightweight champion Islam Makhachev.

Former ARES Heavyweight champion Slim Trabelsi will also be in action on this card, in a bout against Pouya Rahmani.

KC 54, featuring the title fight between Tyrone Spong and Sam Alvey in the main event, can be viewed for free tonight from 6 pm CEST on Karate Combat's YouTube channel.

✍🏽: @MauritsSchool from @MainEventNL