NAOYA INOUE may not be fighting on Christmas Eve after all.
Sam Goodman, the Australian contender who was scheduled to challenge Inoue for the Japanese superstar’s IBF, WBA, WBC and WBO 122-pound titles in Tokyo on December 24, suffered a cut during a sparring session on Friday that forced him to retire to withdraw from the 12-round title fight that evening. Goodman suffered a cut just above his left eyelid during his scheduled final sparring session before flying from Australia to Japan on Sunday.
Australian broadcast journalist Ben Damon first reported the news of Goodman’s cut on social media on Friday evening.
Boxing News has confirmed that Goodman’s handlers have pushed for the entire event to be postponed until January 24 to accommodate the No. 1 contender in both the IBF and WBO junior featherweight rankings.
Inoue’s representatives have considered replacing Goodman (19-0, 8 KOs) with Japan’s Toshiki Shimomachi (19-1-3, 12 KOs), who is facing another Japanese boxer, Misaki Hirano (11-1, 4 KOs). , should compete. , in a 10-round match on the December 24 undercard.
Simomachi is ranked No. 5 by the IBF, No. 8 by the WBC and No. 11 by the WBA in the 122-pound class. The WBO lists Simomachi as their No. 7 contender in the featherweight division (126 pounds).
Ariake Arena is sold out for the card that was scheduled to feature Inoue-Goodman, which was a key reason why Inoue’s handlers didn’t want to postpone the event.
Perhaps more problematically, Shimomachi is a right-handed hitter standing at 5’7″, while Goodman is 5’7″ and fights from a right-handed stance. The switch in strategies for a southpaw, without the benefit of much sparring against left-handed boxers, if any, apparently encouraged Inoue’s trainer at this late point in training camp to simply let him fight Goodman a month later.
However, a one-month delay could disrupt Inoue’s plans for 2025.
Inoue intended to return to the ring on April 12 in Las Vegas when he defeated Goodman on December 24. His likely opponent for this fight would have been Mexican contender Alan Picasso (30-0-1, 16 KOs), who must first defeat Colombia Yehison Cuello (13-2-1, 11 KOs) remains the WBC challenger on Saturday evening in Tijuana No. 1 for one of Inoue’s four championships. Should Inoue be successful in consecutive mandatory defenses against Goodman and Picasso, he would like to face WBC bantamweight champion Junto Nakatani (29-0, 22 KOs) at the Tokyo Dome, which would also be the biggest fight in Japanese boxing history late next Summer or early next fall. Nakatani would need to win another fight, perhaps in his 122-pound debut, to also secure his spot in the showdown with Inoue.
