Street Fighter legends Daigo Umehara and MenaRD will fight in a first-to-10 at the Saudi-owned fighting game tournament Evo Japan in Tokyo. The boxing-inspired event will also feature two undercard matches.

Japanese fighting game legend Daigo Umehara (“The Beast”) will face off against Saul Leonardo (“MenaRD”) Mena II from the Dominican Republic in a Street Fighter 6 first-to-10 exhibition set this Wednesday, a day before the start of the now Saudi-owned fighting game tournament Evo Japan. Their confrontation will kick off the event and is advertised through a boxing-style fight card, complete with two undercard matches to warm things up. MenaRD is the one to have first issued a challenge to Daigo through a lengthy post on X (formerly Twitter).

Daigo is a highly respected figure within the FGC (fighting game community), and at 44 years old, he has been competing in the genre for almost 30 years. The Japanese player has multiple major tournament victories under his belt, six of which are Evo first-place finishes (Super Street Fighter II Turbo in 2003 and 2004, Guilty Gear XX also in 2003 and 2004, Street Fighter IV in 2009, and Super Street Fighter IV in 2010). Last but not least, Daigo is known for what is arguably the biggest moment in fighting game history: EVO moment 37, the “Daigo parry.”

As for challenger MenaRD, he represents a younger generation of champions. The 26-year-old Dominican player first made a name for himself in Street Fighter V with a Capcom Cup win in 2017 and has been on a roll ever since, with multiple first-place finishes across many major tournaments for the remainder of the game’s lifespan. In 2023, he became the last player to ever be crowned Street Fighter V Capcom Cup champion with a victory over Chinese player Zhen. But for MenaRD, this was only the beginning of his legendary career. He has been dominating the competition in Street Fighter 6, securing his first Evo title in Evo Japan 2024, only to win it again the next year. This would be followed up by his biggest accomplishment to date: winning EVO Vegas 2025, the tournament that started it all.

Founded in 1996 by Tom Cannon, who now spearheads the development of Riot’s fighting game 2XKO, the Evolution Championship Series (“Evo”) is an annual tournament dedicated to fighting games. While originally limited to the US, 2017 would see Evo going places with the first edition of Evo Japan, followed by Evo France in 2025.

The tournament series has since been acquired by Saudi Arabia’s Qiddiya, who wants to bring Evo to more countries: “We are incredibly excited about the long-term commitments we can now make to the community, including support for locals, new Evo locations, increased prize pools, new event formats, and the untold opportunities that will arise from them.” These new locations include Singapore, Morocco, Brazil, China, Mexico, and the Middle East. 

Saudi Arabia also owns Japanese developers SNK, who are responsible for creating popular series such as The King of Fighters, Fatal Fury, and Samurai Shodown (Samurai Spirits in Japan.) Their most recent title “Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves” is infamous for featuring real-world athlete Cristiano Ronaldo as a playable character.