{"id":518111,"date":"2026-04-07T18:57:07","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T18:57:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/518111\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T18:57:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T18:57:07","slug":"naoya-inoue-teases-major-fight-after-junto-nakatani-showdown-ive-wanted-to-do-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/518111\/","title":{"rendered":"Naoya Inoue teases major fight after Junto Nakatani showdown: “I’ve wanted to do it”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Naoya Inoue<\/a> could emerge as the pound-for-pound number one after his clash with Junto Nakatani next month, although before a move up to featherweight, there is another fight on the mind of \u2018The Monster\u2019.<\/p>\n

Inoue has been a dominant force across both bantamweight and super-bantamweight, becoming an undisputed champion in both divisions and maintaining his undefeated record, but fans continue to push for the Japanese phenomenon to move up to featherweight.<\/p>\n

First, a \u2018motivated\u2019 Inoue takes on his toughest test to date<\/a>, tasked with fellow domestic superstar Nakatani, in what is undoubtedly the biggest fight in the history of Japanese boxing, with the move to 126lbs expected to follow soon after.<\/p>\n

However, on a TikTok live, Inoue revealed that he plans to have two more fights at super-bantamweight, including Nakatani, before seeking honours in a fifth weight division, as per Yahoo Japan<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think featherweight will be my final challenge. After the Nakatani fight, and one other fight I\u2019ve wanted to do, my last challenge will be in featherweight.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not going to move up right away, so I\u2019d like to decide [a fight] with the [featherweight] champion at that time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fans are now beginning to speculate that Inoue could be lining up a scrap with unified super-flyweight champion and pound-for-pound rival, Jesse \u2018Bam\u2019 Rodriguez<\/a>, who is being touted for a bantamweight world title challenge against either Antonio Vargas or Christian Medina Jimenez.<\/p>\n

Should Rodriguez get his hands on a bantamweight crown, a door may open for a shot at the undisputed super-bantamweight throne, before Inoue advances up to featherweight and moves out of the Texan\u2019s reach.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Naoya Inoue could emerge as the pound-for-pound number one after his clash with Junto Nakatani next month, although…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":518112,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-518111","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boxing","8":"tag-boxing","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518111","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=518111"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/518111\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/518112"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=518111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=518111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=518111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}