K-1 WORLD MAX 2012 champion Murthel Groenhart was "not at all" impressed with the latest K-1 MAX event, which took place in Pattaya, Thailand on October 11 and featured a headline fight between Buakaw Banchamek and Enriko Kehl.

Controversy engulfed proceedings when Buakaw left the ring at the end of the third round, ignoring the judges' order for the fight to go an extra round. Buakaw has hinted at fears of being subjected to a corrupt decision but has also himself been accused of deliberately sabotaging the event.

Whatever the real reasons behind his unexpected exit from the ring, the incident is just the latest in a string of setbacks which have tarnished the once glorious K-1 brand name. Groenhart won the K-1 MAX in 2012, widely considered the last ‘real' K-1 MAX tournament before new owners took the brand name over.

"I wasn't really impressed with the fight, not at all. I thought Buakaw should have been declared the winner, I didn't see the need for an extra round. It was good for him to step out of the ring and walk away because it showed that something is wrong with the way the event was organized," he tells Bloody Elbow.

"In the last two years I talked with people, my friends, fans, media, who didn't want to hear it when I said K-1 was finished. But now people can see that there is something wrong with it because normally you don't see Buakaw do something like this."

Groenhart has another axe to grind with K-1: he is still owed money from his 2012 win.

"They still didn't pay me all my money. They paid me half of it only, I am still waiting for the other half," he says.

"It is terrible. Organizations get big because of the fighters - if they don't have fighters they don't have an organization, so they need to treat the fighters with respect. If you treat the guys with respect then they get good fights and the best fighters.

"But K-1 doesn't treat its fighters with respect and now you see what result they get: one of the sport's best fighters just walks out of their ring and just gives the belt away like it is nothing. It was like watching a top football player just walk off the field. It shows that there is something wrong."

Kehl was reduced to tears of joy when the K-1 MAX belt was wrapped around his waist following Buakaw's exit from the ring, but Groenhart doesn't see him -or Buakaw previously - as a true successor to the title.

"The way I see it, I am still the reigning champion. Every year the K-1 organized a tournament and the previous year's champion would be in the line-up and would have to prove himself again. But I didn't get any invitation in 2013 or 2014. So I didn't consider Buakaw - or now Enriko Kehl - to be real K-1 champions because they didn't fight the last real champion, which was me," he says.

"I think K-1 is finished now, really. I don't see how they come back from this. So if guys like Buakaw and Kehl really want to fight the best guys they will have to go to GLORY. It is a real shame; I gave them great fights in 2012, I'm the last real K-1 champion, and now there is nothing. I feel very bad about this situation but there is nothing can be done about it."

Groenhart is waiting for news of his next fight and in the meantime is "training hard and working on my personal-training business". He will be watching the lightweight title fight at GLORY 18 closely on November 7 as Davit Kiria defends the belt against Robin van Roosmalen.

Kiria won the belt with an epic comeback win over Andy Ristie at GLORY 14 ZAGREB in April and this is his first defense. There is a twist: Van Roosmalen is the challenger but also the favorite, having fought Kiria twice before - 2011 and 2013 - and won unanimous decisions in both.

"Yeah I think Van Roosmalen will kick Kiria's ass," says Groenhart, who has faced both of them in the ring.

"I think Kiria is a good fighter but Van Roosmalen knows how to fight this guy and already beat him two times, so why not a third? I know Kiria beat me in Los Angeles [at GLORY 10] but I was in bad condition for that fight, I was ill, I shouldn't have fought. Next time will be different."

As for his own GLORY return, Groenhart is waiting for news. But he knows what his goals are: "So now I am at #7 in the rankings but I want to be at the top.

"I need to take all the fighters above me: Kiria, Van Roosmalen, Ristie, Petrosyan, all of them. These are the guys I want to fight. Ristie is in good shape at the moment, he's looking like the most dangerous [lightweight] right now."