Three Bouts Added to Rizin 45 Lineup on New Year’s Eve

The lineup for Rizin Fighting Federation’s traditional New Year’s Eve card continues to grow, as the Japanese promotion recently announced three new additions to the lineup.

Two of those bouts — Tsuyoshi Kamiyama vs. Mikio Ueda and Shinobu Ota vs. Ryusei Ashizawa — will be contested under MMA rules, while the third —Rukiya Anpo vs. Minoru Kimura — is a kickboxing affair.

Rizin 45 takes place on Dec. 31 at Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan, and features a bantamweight title tilt pitting reigning champ Juan Archuleta against Kai Asakura. The event will also see Kyoji Horiguchi square off against Makoto Takahasi for the flyweight crown.

Kamiyama has been victorious in eight of his 10 professional outings — all under the Rizin banner. Most recently, “Sudario” defeated Dong Hwan Lim via third-round technical knockout at Rizin Landmark Vol. 6 on Oct. 1. All but one of his triumphs have come by way of KO or TKO.

Ueda has won two straight bouts after dropping his promotional debut to Tsuyoshi Kosaka at Rizin 35. Since then, the 28-year-old Tokyo native has vanquished Mu Jae Song and Hideki Sekine in a combined 34 seconds.

Ota had a two-fight winning streak snapped at Rizin Landmark Vol. 6, where he suffered a split-decision defeat to Shoko Sato. The Paraestra Kashiwa product owns a 4-3 career mark while competing exclusively under the Rizin banner.

Ashizawa will be making his MMA debut. He has compiled a 25-13 kickboxing record that includes numerous fights for the K-1 organization.