Jaideep takes it to Taiei Kin at the Seoul GP 2009

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K-1 announced a new opening fight for the upcoming Grand Prix event on December 5.  Final 16 competitor and Seoul GP champion Singh "Heart" Jaideep will face Makoto Uehara.  This will be Uehara's 2nd K-1 appearance, as he was last seen in 2008 defeating Yong Soo Park in the quarter finals of the Taipei GP.  An injury suffered in that fight forced Uehara out of the tournament and out of K-1 action for the past year.

Although Uehara is coming off the win over Park, this looks to be mostly a showcase fight for Jaideep.  After a strong performance at the Seoul GP (an event that sadly was not widely seen), Jaideep's first high profile K-1 outing was the notoriously boring fight with Ewerton Teixeira at the Final 16, a fight in which both men came out with their reputations damaged.  K-1 has made it very clear that they want to use Jaideep as a way to gain a foothold and popularity in the potentially huge Indian market, and so they need to clear the bad taste of the Final 16 out of fan's mouths.  A strong showing here will be a great help to Jaideep.  Look for him to use his reach to take Uehara out and begin moving back up the rankings.