Notes on the Sanda World Cup Part 1
We look at a slick Russian stylist and dive into why high crotch takedowns are so common in Sanda.
The 11th Sanda World Cup wrapped up earlier this month, with China taking their usual commanding lead, and a strong performance from Vietnam that saw them to two gold medals in the men’s event. Iranian athletes were notably absent, presumably due to recent geopolitical events. Iran’s absence left a noticeable gap, as they typically takes second place on the medal table. The absence of 70kg World Champion, Erfan Piraghom, cleared the way for Vietnam’s Truong Van Chuong.
The gold medalists of the men’s Sanda event were as follows:
48kg: 🇨🇳 Li Jianhui
52kg: 🇻🇳 Van Tam Dinh
56kg: 🇷🇺 Arsen Umalatov
60kg: 🇨🇳 Wang Zunlong
65kg: 🇨🇳 Wang Chengjin
70kg: 🇻🇳 Truong Van Chuong
75kg: 🇨🇳 Jin Gensheng
80kg: 🇩🇿 Marouane Adimi
85kg: 🇪🇬 Alhussein Wahdan
100kg: 🇨🇳 Cai Jiahao
100+kg: 🇪🇬 Ahmed Shalaby
The standout fighter of the tournament to me was China’s Wang Chengjin, a slick southpaw with an unusually crafty inside game. Chengjin dominated each of his matches in impressive fashion, replicating his 65kg gold medal at last year’s World Championships. Chengjin’s dexterous, stabbing lead hook is a constant feature of his game, but this time around he paired it more actively with lead-hand attacks down the middle, splitting guards with a quick up-jab or powerful lead uppercuts. We’ve already covered Chengjin’s unique style, however, so I’ll focus this article on unexplored athletes and go over the other fighters who grabbed my attention most.
Arsen Umalatov
Arsen Umalatov has been Russia’s standout athlete in Sanda recently, winning gold at 56kg in the 2025 World Championships and the recent World Cup. Russian fighters tend not to be slick kickers, and this is especially relevant in the lower weights, where they often have to fight Chinese and Vietnamese opponents with more skilled and dexterous kicking games. One way to get around that deficit is with aggressive pressure, but Russian Sanda fighters tend to have an amateur boxing sort of temperament, more comfortable moving in and out at mid-range than pressing relentlessly. As a result, Russians in Sanda tend to become defensively sound and skilled at nullifying kicks.
Umalatov is most comfortable at mid-range, just far enough away to see his opponent’s kicks coming and pull his lead leg back. He can poke away with jabs and inside leg kicks, but his true advantage comes from nullifying his opponent’s weapons on the outside and picking the right times to cover distance and rack up points.
His trademark punch is the leaping lead hook, which lets him initiate offense from otherwise outside range. Jabbing into range can be difficult in a sport like Sanda, as the jab acts as a tell for the opponent’s higher-scoring kicks. Similarly, a powerful left hook is typically a short range tool that requires a shift of weight onto the lead foot, which allows a mobile kicker to vacate range and respond with a longer weapon.
Umalatov’s leaping lead hook lets him initiate from kicking range without first shifting his weight or stepping his lead foot and tipping off his intentions. His weight stays distributed relatively evenly, his torso upright, as he brings his rear foot forward of his lead and skips into the hook. Umalatov’s back-and-forth rhythmic bouncing hides the leap and makes it difficult to time, but should his opponent throw a kick as he leaps, he quickly moves through the kick’s effective range and lands while they remain on one leg.
The bouncing and leaping movements make it difficult for kickers to time Umalatov without either falling short or eating counters, but he pairs it with marching front kicks to further dissuade kicking. Umalatov will often initiate with a rear front kick and, once the threat is established, he’ll start picking up his legs as if to kick and marching forward into the opposite stance.
Leading with a front kick is a good way to fend off round kickers in general, since the front kick is a longer tool that jams up the kicking lane and pushes the opponent back. If they leave their stance to kick as the front kick comes, there’s a good chance they’ll eat it and lose balance or even fall down. By showing the front kick to march forward, Umalatov makes it even more difficult to feel secure kicking him, as kicks will often collide off his raised shin, or lose power as he closes distance before they can extend fully.
The marching front kicks take Umalatov safely through kicking range into his own offense. He relies heavily on shifting combinations to score on the feet, and the threat of the front kick and forward march allows him to start his entry with an advantage, his opponent forced backwards and psyched out of intercepting with their own kick.
Umalatov likes to march forward into left hooks or kicks with his left leg as his opponent gives ground. One of the main risks for kickers in Sanda is that crafty opponents are looking to catch them and convert the kicks into takedowns, but by pushing his opponent back and kicking on the march, Umalatov greatly mitigates that threat. A fighter who is firmly planted and ready to step in as he grabs a kick stands a much better chance of disrupting the kicker’s balance than one whose momentum is already flying backwards.
The marching footwork also allows sensitivity in Umalatov’s approach, as he doesn’t commit to kicking before he can see his opponent’s reaction. If they plant and counter, he can backtrack and bail on his march, keeping them at range with his jab or planting with a right-hand counter. If they tumble backwards, he can simply step his rear leg all the way through and throw up his lead leg.
Since Umalatov is mostly a mid-range fighter who is neither looking to pressure constantly or play keep-away, most of his attack involves quickly closing distance. An important tool for reliable distance closing is having a few solid mixups - pairs of strikes with similar preliminary motions that prevent the opponent from picking up telegraphs. Umalatov’s rear front kick and lead-leg body kick pair effectively in this way, with the threat of the front kick setting up his march into the body kick. He’ll also fake the front kick into a superman punch:
Umalatov picks up his rear leg as if to kick, before leaping into a superman punch. His opponent sees the front kick coming and picks up their lead leg to check or gives ground, leaving them open to the leaping punch.
The rapid closing of distance inherent to Umalatov’s offense means that he is often thrust into the clinch or exposed to reactive takedowns, but his skill in the clinch ties his game together. He’s an excellent defensive wrestler who can afford to risk stepping onto his opponent’s shots, since he can often convert them to his own points by sprawling or throwing. In the clinch, he scores consistently with foot sweeps and trips.
Fighters in Sanda only have a couple seconds to secure a takedown in the clinch before the fight is reset. The best opportunity to convert is right as fighters enter the clinch. Once they get into a solid over/under position or dueling collar ties, a takedown usually isn’t coming, so many fighters relax and wait for the ref to break it up.
Umalatov is uniquely crafty at scoring from these positions, using an underhook or a post under the armpit to direct his opponent’s weight onto one leg, while blocking it or hacking at it with his own foot. It’s a low effort move that doesn’t require any real energy and is fairly low risk, but he scores with it reliably whether his opponent is moving actively and trying to be offensive, or relaxing and waiting for a break.
Russian Sanda fighters often specialize in catching kicks in order to mitigate their weakness at kicking range. Umalatov’s marching footwork handles a lot of that for him, but he also has a soft spot for the cross catch:
A cross catch is a kick caught the “wrong way,” with the far-side arm crossing over the body to block the kick, and the near-side arm scooping under to shelve the leg on the shoulder. The reason catching kicks is typically not done this way is that dropping the kick-side arm leaves the head dangerously open to the kick, but careful timing or a rapid closing of distance can mitigate the danger. Umalatov will at times even go for cross catches against his opponent’s leg kicks, and while he rarely ends up hiking the leg fully up on his shoulder, it can still off-balance them enough for him to chain it into a scoring takedown.
The cross catch is a favorite of Muslim Salikhov, Sanda all time great turned MMA fighter who now applies them in the UFC Octagon:
We talked in depth about the nuances and dangers of the cross catch in UFC Macao: Kicks & How Not To Catch Them.
Arsen Baghryan & the Mighty High Crotch
Arsen Umalatov was not the only notable Arsen competing at the World Cup. Armenia’s Arsen Baghryan took second place at 60kg, losing in the finals to China’s Wang Zunlong. Baghryan is very short, but that did not stop him from consistently hoisting his opponents overhead and flipping them upside down. His weapon of choice was the high crotch, and it gives us a chance to examine why high crotch takedowns are so common in Sanda.
When we think of a perfect takedown, what usually comes to mind is an explosive double leg. The quick entry and decisive finish make the double leg very useful for MMA, where quickly covering distance and securing control on top are crucial to one’s success. But explosive double legs are often not the best option in Sanda. Under the International Wushu Federation’s ruleset, a kick to the body or head is worth two points and a kick to the leg one point. Takedowns are worth either two points or one depending on whether the attacker stays on his feet or follows the defender to the ground, respectively. So if you eat a kick to the body and take the opponent to the ground, ending up on top of him, you still lose the exchange.
The ideal takedown in Sanda throws the defender to the ground while leaving the attacker on his feet. This means that takedowns which give the attacker better control of his own momentum have a higher value, and it’s doubly important to avoid putting oneself in positions that give the defender control of one’s posture, to avoid being dragged to the mat.
You certainly see double leg and single leg takedowns in Sanda not infrequently, but high crotch shots become a lot more common under the points-based ruleset. Double legs risk one’s momentum carrying him to the ground, while single legs put the head near the opponent’s chest, where weight can be collapsed on it in a sprawl. The high crotch offers a useful middle ground that avoids both pitfalls:
Baghryan attacks the high crotch with a controlled entry, his forward momentum coming to a stop as he seizes the leg. His head remains outside his opponent’s hip and chest - as long as the entry is quick and clean, it’s difficult for the defender to immediately put weight on his head and force his posture down. Because he’s only attacking one leg, he can take a moment to steady himself and get his head, back, and hips aligned directly under his opponent’s center of gravity, aided by his short stature, and he doesn’t have to chase the far leg as one often does when finishing a double leg. The lifting finish is clean, decisive, and leaves the defender without an easy way to pull Baghryan down with him as he’s tipped arse over tea kettle.
Once Baghryan is in on his opponents leg, he can score reliably, but the trick for him is closing the distance to secure it. When dealing with a much longer striker, generally the simplest options are to either pressure steadily and try to stay inside his effective range, or back off and force the longer man to come forward, meeting him in the middle when he steps in to attack. Both strategies have their own tradeoffs. Constant pressure involves walking through a range where the opponent’s high-scoring kicks become open but your own offense is null, while playing back gives the taller man time to pick away with low-effort kicks, which are difficult to counter.
Baghryan does a good job walking the middle path between these two extremes, spending much time at a range where he’s not an easy target, while pressuring in blitzes to score quickly when the time is right. Ideally he wants his opponent to throw a kick near the end of their range that he can convert to a takedown, but he knows he can’t rely on reactive openings entirely and must create his own.
Baghryan will use his own kicks to close distance through the perilous middle range, stepping in off them to enter his takedowns or punches:
Shifting forward off leg kicks puts Baghryan right in position to attack his high crotch. He’ll also employ a step-up body kick with his lead leg, a classic tool for short punchers that covers their advance and plants their lead leg down right in punching range.
Baghryan also has an excellent sense for when it’s time to sell out and blitz. Running in willy-nilly on a sound opponent is obviously risky, as it involves stepping out of stance while giving the opponent time to counter. But crafty blitzers will choose moments where their opponent isn’t able to react immediately - when they’re distracted by another threat, as they recover from a missed strike, or any other situation where their stance and attention isn’t geared toward reading and countering an immediate charge.
Baghryan counters a leg kick by stepping in and punching the body, giving him the perfect opening to swarm as his opponent recovers his stance. Baghryan overwhelms him with offense, blinding him with a flurry of punches, directing his attention downward with a body kick, then smashing in a couple hard punches as his hands drop. By the time his opponent reacts to the punches, Baghryan has already dropped down on his hips and begun hoisting him into the air. Baghryan needed only a small opening, his keen eye for transitional offense allowing him to parlay it into a huge scoring moment.
But the bread and butter of Baghryan’s arsenal is converting his opponents’ kicks into his high crotch takedowns. The most common attack you’ll see in Sanda is a light, flicking inside leg kick. The primacy of kicks in Sanda’s scoring system means that fighters frequently rely on them, but the presence of takedowns means they need to avoid having their kicks caught. Flicking inside leg kicks act like a rangier jab - a low-commitment option to attack the nearest target. It allows a fighter to engage and draw reactions without opening himself up.
Catching these light inside leg kicks is very difficult. They don’t ride up the thigh like outside leg kicks tend to, there’s little weight behind them so the kicking leg snaps back quickly, and often only the foot or the tip of the toes makes contact. Baghryan’s short stature ends up helping him here, as there’s not much distance between his torso and his knee, his arms able to reach nearly to the floor with only a slight bend. He can drop his lead hand to snag the kicking foot without too much risk, as his rear hand remains high to block a head kick on the same side if the inside leg kick is faked. Once he has a grip on the ankle, it’s easy to transition to a high crotch, wrapping his rear hand deep around the knee and pulling himself up to the crotch grip, where he can lift and dump.
Most of Baghryan’s high crotch attacks come off his opponent’s outside leg kicks, as they flow more smoothly into takedowns. There’s more risk to reaching down for outside leg kicks, as you use the hand that would otherwise block a same-side head kick, risking feints or question mark kicks. The easiest way to mitigate that threat is to only reach down after the kick has made contact with the leg.
Note how Baghryan steps out as the kick arrives to widen his base, which causes the kick to ride up his leg, where it’s easier to grab. The entry into a high crotch is simple from here - the outside hand is already behind the knee, and the inside hand can just slide right into the crotch as his rear leg steps forward, putting him in position to lift.
Linear kicks are a common tool to initiate offense in Sanda, as they are more difficult to catch. A round kick to the body presents a lot of shin surface to grab onto and often slides right up into the armpit where catching in natural, but a front or side kick lands with a much smaller surface and knocks the defender back. But Baghryan is well prepared to catch and counter these kicks too.
Catching a linear kick is much easier if you can defuse much of the kick’s pushing force. Staying outside its effective range and making the opponent extend to reach you can cause the kick to lose power, and stepping to the side slightly as it arrives can make it miss your center of mass and slide off.
Baghryan’s inside hand scoops underneath the kick and shelves it on the wrist, while his outside hand closes in to trap it, pinching the foot together and preventing the heel from slipping. A common finish off these catches is the “golf swing,” pulling the foot back while swinging it inside and tipping the opponent off balance. If they start limp-legging or rotating their heel to extract the leg, Baghryan will run them down until they fall, or turn back toward him where he can enter a shot.
By now you may be wondering why the taller fighters don’t simply kick the shorter fighter in the head when he’s trying to grab their leg. Well, Baghryan can catch those too! Round kicks to the body and head require a different sort of catch, since eating the kick and catching them in the armpit would either give up points in the case of a body kick, or just expose the head during a headkick.
Baghryan uses the type of catch you’ll see commonly in Muay Thai - the near arm takes the kick on the forearm, while the far hand scoops underneath to trap the leg. In Muay Thai, these are usually finished by dragging the leg across the body and hitting a sweep. But for Baghryan, he can simply pull the heel toward him and drag the opponent right into his high crotch, or go with the kick’s momentum and swing the leg inwards with the golf swing motion.
While Arsen Baghryan does a remarkable job of fighting around his physical limitations, his lack of height and reach is nonetheless a major obstacle. In both the recent World Cup and last year’s World Championships, he lost to the eventual gold medalist, Wang Zhunlong. Zhunlong is a tall, rangy kicker who was able to pick at Baghryan with noncommittal kicks, racking up points and avoiding his counters.
One of the fundamental problems with a style like Baghryan’s is that his counters to his opponent’s flicking inside leg kicks require more commitment than the kicks do, and the lighter weights have plenty of Chinese and Vietnamese fighters who excel at kicking without exposing themselves to takedowns.
Baghryan’s struggles with Zhunlong offer an interesting insight into how Sanda’s scoring balances kickboxing and wrestling. The threat of takedowns influences the shape that kicks take, incentivizing and dissuading certain tactics. But it’s difficult to beat an elite opponent with only takedowns, since taking kicks to the body or head to score a takedown results in either an even score or a loss on the exchange, and the lower-scoring leg kicks can be modified to avoid wrestling in the hands of an elite practitioner. This dynamic demonstrates why the Iranians and Russians tend to excel in Sanda, as they combine strong wrestling with effective tactics to stymie kickers.
In part two, we’ll look at a Vietnamese gold medalist who modifies his kicking tactics to avoid takedowns, and a Belarusian silver medalist who eschews most common meta tactics in favor of doing his best Dmitry Bivol imitation.
If you liked this article, you may also enjoy Wang Chengjin: Framing & Transitional Attacks in Sanda and 3 Neat Strikers You’ve Never Heard Of: