Naoya Inoue and Junto Nakatani can provide the perfect counter for Joshua vs Paul

Anthony Joshua’s frustrating fight, or approach to a fight, with YouTuber-turned-boxer Jake Paul may very well have left a sour taste in your mouth. Luckily, ’tis the season for mulled wine, hot chocolate and Baileys, but if you’re not confident in the palate-cleansing efficacy of these festive fluids, don’t despair. The day after Boxing Day is Boxing Day, as two of the best fighters on the planet step into the ring on the same card.

Enter Naoya Inoue and Junto Nakatani, the Japanese duo seeking to fight their own duel in 2026, but with their respective tests awaiting them on December 27.

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That night in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Inoue will defend his undisputed super bantamweight titles against Alan Picasso (please respect restraint and avoid any artist-related puns in this article). In the previous fight, Junto Nakatani debuted in the same division, facing Sebastián Hernández Reyes.

All four fighters are undefeated. According to the indian sport In the rankings, Inoue is the second-best living boxer and Nakatani floats at No. 8. While their next opponents lack the profile and pedigree of Inoue and Nakatani (who vacated his unified bantamweight belts to move up a division here), they are undefeated and respectable foes.

Of course, Picasso (who also goes by his middle name, David) and Reyes are underdogs this weekend, but obviously not to the extent that Paul was against “AJ,” a former world heavyweight champion. Neither of them, by the way, will use the influencer’s tactics of jumping (around a larger ring than usual) and launching themselves at their opponent’s legs to buy time and avoid damage. Picasso and Reyes will come to fight, for better or worse. In fact, they will come to win.

Still, they may face the same fate as Paul: the kind of punishment detention to, for example, break his jaw in two places. But Picasso and Reyes will get in on the action anyway and accept that this may be the price of glory. Without a doubt it is the price of honor.

In this way, Saturday’s event will be a welcome counterblow to last Friday’s sporting farce and commercial giant. It’s an evening for traditionalists, but please everyone come. If Joshua vs. Paul appealed to something in you, even if just for its spectacle, then stay a little longer than that and a batch More real boxing.

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Overall, this event should be appreciated for the showcase of two of the best wrestlers in the sport. But one cannot, in good conscience, gush about these elements without addressing the drawbacks (and there are some).

Firstly, there is the political element, and it goes beyond the “boxing politics” of Joshua’s six-round dismissal of Paul. It is a question of global politics. Saudi Arabia can be accused of using this event – ​​the latest in its long line of high-profile boxing spectacles over the past two years – as a sports-washing tool, as the Gulf state continues a perceived attempt to distract from its poor human rights record.

Secondly, and much less importantly, there is the risk of presenting Inoue and Nakatani’s fights as stepping stones on the path to their own long-awaited showdown.

Indeed, a clash between 32-year-old Inoue (undisputed two-weight king and four-weight champion) and 27-year-old Nakatani (three-weight champion) is delightful.

Inoue has long been recognized as one of the best boxers in the world, if not – for a while – he better, but detractors have pointed out the diminutive destroyer’s lack of big-name opponents. This is not because he has avoided it, but rather the fact that the lower weight classes house fewer stars. However, in Nakatani, he could find an opponent on the cusp of danger and marketability.

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However, we’ve been here before: “If A beats X and B beats Y, then A and B can have their long-awaited fight next.” This strategy is notoriously flawed, such is the chaos of boxing.

We received that evidence two years ago, the month Joshua and Deontay Wilder shared an undercard in the same city that will host Saturday’s fights. Joshua destroyed Otto Wallin, but the destruction was still unraveling because, 30 minutes earlier, Wilder had been beaten by Joseph Parker for 12 rounds. With that, Joshua vs Wilder moved away from the distance, perhaps forever.

Similarly, in May, a big rematch between Devin Haney and Ryan Garcia failed when they boxed in the same ring but returned different results; Haney, though poor, bested José Ramírez, only for García to be knocked down and outpointed by Rolly Romero in an unexpected loss.

So here we are again. And as much as Inoue is the A-side in a showdown with Nakatani, and as formidable as the “Monster” is, there is reason to worry about him this weekend. In two of his last five fights, Inoue has gone down, showing a vulnerability that could derail the Saudi’s machinations to pair him with Nakatani.

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It’s true that Nakatani’s opponent on Saturday has a 90 percent knockout rate (18 finishes out of 20 wins). By contrast, Picasso enters his fight against Inoue with 17 KOs in 32 wins. It could still be Nakatani who slips up here, especially considering he’s at a new weight: three divisions above the class where he won his first world title.

And that could also influence a possible clash with Inoue. The Monster has been at super bantamweight for two and a half years, having previously conquered two of the same divisions as Nakatani. Still, Inoue’s first world title came at light flyweight, where he was smaller than Nakatani had ever been. That way, maybe Nakatani will become super bantamweight more easily than his compatriot.

As with Joshua vs Paul, there are many questions to be answered. But while the Saudi involvement makes Inoue vs Nakatani a problematic saga, many fans will see it as a more acceptable version of pugilism.