Mohamed Said Maalem has finally scaled the summit of mixed martial arts, but the glow of championship gold has not dimmed the memory of a rival he refuses to forget.
Even after delivering a career-defining triumph, the Algerian-Swiss powerhouse finds himself drawn back into the orbit of Mohammad Fakhreddine.
At BRAVE CF 106 in Ljubljana, Slovenia, on Saturday, June 6, Said Maalem authored one of the most dramatic turnarounds in recent memory.
Facing defending champion and rival Erko “The Bounty Hunter” Jun in a high-stakes rematch, he absorbed adversity before flipping the contest on its head, sealing a fourth-round stoppage to capture the BRAVE CF Light Heavyweight World Title in the co-main event.
Yet the celebration carried an unmistakable undertone of unfinished history.
During his post-fight conversation with play-by-play voice Phil Campbell, the newly crowned king wasted no time redirecting attention toward a familiar adversary.
“Give me Fakhreddine. Fahkro, come here, boy,” Said Maalem declared.
The response from the reigning BRAVE CF Middleweight World Champion came swiftly and without hesitation.
“Challenge accepted. I’m about to come and get your a** again,” Fakhreddine replied on social media.
The hostility between the two is rooted in a turbulent shared past that has refused to fade with time.
Their first encounter at BRAVE CF 52 in August 2021 in Milan, Italy, saw Said Maalem seemingly reach the pinnacle of his career after overwhelming Fakhreddine and securing a first-round technical knockout for the vacant BRAVE CF Light Heavyweight World Title.
He even left the arena with the belt wrapped around his waist, believing destiny had finally answered.
That moment, however, was short-lived. A post-fight review later revealed illegal strikes to the back of the head during the finishing sequence, prompting officials and the Italian commission to overturn the result to a no-contest.
The victory, along with the championship celebration, was erased from the record.
When fate brought them together again at BRAVE CF 57 — this time happening in Bahrain — in March 2022, Fakhreddine settled the score in definitive fashion, halting Said Maalem in the second round to seize the vacant crown and firmly slam the door on his rival’s redemption arc.
Now, with the belt once again resting on his shoulders, Said Maalem stands at another crossroads.
The ghost of Milan and the sting of defeat in their rematch continue to linger, and the path forward appears to lead back to the same man who has defined so much of Said Maalem’s anguish.
With BRAVE CF’s competitive landscape shifting once more, this renewed friction could pave the way for the most consequential trilogy clash in the promotion’s history, and potentially the most heated rivalry the growing Arab MMA scene has ever witnessed.
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