One of the controversial problems with the K-1 Premium Dynamite card over the New Year's Eve round of events was that the rules between Yarennoka and K-1 were different, therefore causing confusion throughout the MMA community. A culmination of that very specific problem happened in one matchup at each event, the Akiyama vs. Misaki soccer kick and the Yamamoto vs. Yahya soccer kicks to end the fight. Both were debated as being illegal, and Misaki's win over Akiyama was deemed a no-contest later. Some interesting news surfaced Wednesday regarding the other matchup.

Fight Entertainment Group, K-1's Parent Company, decided to give Yamamoto the win even though he ended the fight by kicking Yahya with soccer kicks to end the fight. Rules for the event were still undetermined to many fans even after the event, but Yahya confirmed in an interview with Sherdog that in fact, soccer kicks were not allowed. It seems like this made a clear cut case for Yahya to have the judgement overturned, but he insisted that he lost fair and square. Apparently, the fight was still under review. Here's the reasoning behind their decision:

In judgement, HERO'S rules director Gen Isono explained that referee Minoru Toyonaga's choice to stop the fight was prompted by seeing Yahya's reaction following the left hook which dropped him to the mat. As the soccer kicks were therefore judged to be subsequent to the referee's choice to stop the fight, they were ruled to have no bearing on the outcome of the bout.

So, they were going to stop the fight after Yahya ate the big left hook, but Yamamoto managed to blast Yahya with soccer kicks before the referee could step in? In my opinion, I think this is incorrect. The referee did make a move to stop the battle, but Yahya was managing to regain position on the ground to begin ascending to his feet when he was struck with the kicks. Once he was struck, the referee then stopped the fight. If you look at the image above, the referee isn't breaking up the fight at the point where Yamamoto's soccer kick lands on Yahya's head. Clearly, he wasn't stopping the fight until after this moment. FEG must have blind mice watching the tapes.

It looks like Yahya got the short straw in this situation. He accepted his defeat already, so it isn't a huge deal for him as far as his record goes. It shows me some incompetence on the part of FEG though, and I don't need more controversy in the Japanese world of MMA, PRIDE brought us enough.