Naoya Inoue and Junto Nakatani are who we thought they were, and a rematch is needed

Naoya Inoue (L) fights Junto Nakatani during their super bantamweight championship boxing contest at Tokyo Dome in Tokyo on May 2, 2026. (Photo by Yuichi YAMAZAKI / AFP via Getty Images) | AFP via Getty Images Naoya Inoue and Junto Nakatani don’t need to run it back with a rematch because of bad scoring, bad refereeing, or any extravagant controversy. In fact, the judges scored Inoue’s decision win quite well, referee Robert Hoyle did a fine job with little reason to get involved much at all, and there is no reason to shout too much about what we saw.

But there are questions that remain. And a big one centers on an accidental clash of heads in the 10th round, which opened up a cut over the eye of Nakatani, and gave Inoue what looked to be a much-needed chance to catch his breath. Nakatani (32-1, 24 KO) had been coming on strong.

The lead Inoue (33-0, 27 KO) had built in the first half was narrowing. The momentum was with Nakatani, the younger man, and he was starting to look really confident. Inoue, meanwhile, was looking more questionable than I can ever recall.

Even going back to his tremendous war with Nonito Donaire in 2019, I can’t remember seeing Inoue look so much like he’d lost the control of a fight, like he was fighting on someone else’s terms, like he was worried . One little clash of heads. The blood got into Nakatani’s eye and it definitely bothered him.