K-1 President Sadaharu Tanikawa unveiled four additional matches Friday for July 5th’s K-1 World MAX 70 kg Final 16 and 63 kg Japan Tournament Finals. Notable for MMA fans, Sydney Olympic wrestler Kazuyuki Miyata will by making his K-1 return against former Japanese featherweight boxing champion and K-1 bad boy Kazuhisa Watanabe. Miyata is coming off a close split decision win over Takafumi Otsuka at DREAM.14 and is undefeated as a featherweight.
Akiyo “Wicky” Nishiura, who TKO’ed Hideo Tokoro at DREAM.14, was the preferred MMA representative but an injury sustained in that fight has kept him from making his K-1 debut.
Shohei Asahara, Toshiki Taniyama and Koya Urabe, who were all victorious in the opening round of the 63 kg tournament but failed to earn a spot in the Final 8, have been added in reserve fights.