MARTIN Nguyen simply couldn’t wait a moment longer.

The pain of the bantamweight title defeat had become unbearable.

Not even a title defence at lightweight could ease the agony.

Nguyen demanded a second chance at Bibiano Fernandes.

He won’t get it — for now anyway — but he has earned a shot at three-division glory.

In Manila on July 27, Sydneysider Nguyen will fight Kevin Belingon for the interim bantamweight title.

If the current One Championship lightweight and featherweight champion wins, he will become the first person in the history of MMA to own three belts in three different classes.

But Nguyen doesn’t see this as the “real” title.

It’s just another thing to collect dust before he secures the genuine product, the strap he was denied in a controversial split-decision defeat to Fernandes back in March.

“At the end of the day, it’s not the real belt but I get the chance, if I win, to get that rematch and redemption,” Nguyen said.

“I want to redeem myself. That’s my main focus after that loss.”

Nguyen’s camp had requested a rematch with Fernandes before closing out a split-decision win over Christian Lee at One Championship Unstoppable Dreams in Singapore last month.

But post fight it was made clear by chairman and chief executive Chatri Sityodtong that it wouldn’t happen.

“I’m sure Bibiano would be on the same page, and he knows the rematch is going to happen, it was a close call and anything could’ve happened,” Nguyen said.

“So I put it out there after my last fight and Chatri knew what we wanted.

“We wanted that rematch and Chatri said ‘focus on this fight first’.

“After I beat Christian, Chatri said ‘I’ve been talking to Bibiano, and he’s going to be out for at least another six weeks, so it’s up to you if you want to wait. You tell me what you want’.

“I said ‘I want to fight, I’m fresh. I’m not even hurt, I’m just frustrated by how this fight turned out. Give me a week, I’ll be ready to go’.”

Sityodtong made contact with Fernandes, who sustained an ankle injury in the fight with Nguyen, and learnt that it would be roughly 14 weeks before the Brazilian would be ready for a rematch.

That’s when Nguyen pressed for Belingon, a man with a 18-5 record and five-straight wins.

“I said to Chatri, ‘I can’t wait that long’, so I picked my favourite city, I love the Filipinos and I love the Philippines in general, so I said ‘I’ll fight the No. 1 contender, Kevin Belingon, on July 27.’

“I hope he gets well and then he can fight for the belt against myself or Belingon.”

Nguyen admitted that the defence of his lightweight and featherweight titles would take a back seat as he plots to win the bantamweight crown.

“I will be defending those titles, just not right now,” Nguyen said.

“I’ll let two guys fight for it and may the best man win. There’s so many contenders and everyone wants a title shot. It’s such a stacked division that you could let a lot of them fight for the title and they deserve it.

“Someone is always going to be complaining about not getting a shot. What better way than to eliminate them one by one by letting them fight each other and then I’ll unify the belt at the end of the year.”