Killer Kid
Sitthichai Sitsongpeenong
Southpaw whose left low kick is the centre of the game rather than a component. Wins the open-stance leg-kick exchange by landing and checking better.
Sitthichai is the most successful Thai fighter of the GLORY era and, like Buakaw before him, a case study in what survives the translation from Thai stadium rules to European kickboxing. A southpaw with an exceptionally heavy left low kick, he adapted to a code without elbows or clinch by making the leg attack the centre of his game rather than one component of it.
His defensive checking is the other half. Fighting southpaw against orthodox opponents puts both fighters' lead legs on the open side, which makes the low-kick exchange the defining battle of the matchup — and Sitthichai consistently won it, both landing and checking. Opponents who tried to out-kick him ended up worse off; those who avoided the exchange gave up the round.
His long series with Marat Grigorian is among the best-matched rivalries in modern kickboxing, and his bouts with Petrosyan are the cleanest available comparison between the two dominant defensive systems of the era.